New Age
by The Sh33p
Summary: In the aftermath of the epic Royal Cup Tournament, life goes on  and not just for the Blitz Team, but is there something else brewing in the background? R&R, enjoy!
1. Celebration! Blowout after the Royal Cup...

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I do not own Zoids.  
  


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New Age

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Celebration! Blow-Out After the Royal Cup!   
  
  
  
"And last of all, I propose a toast. To competition, to challenges new and old, friendship and glory, but most of all, I propose a toast to Bit Cloud and the Blitz Team!" Leon Tauros shouted, earning a number of cheersfrom those gathered. All of six hours ago, the impossible became reality, Bit Cloud had defeated Vega Obscura in one of the most epic battles since the days of the first Royal Cup over a century earlier. From there, it`d been nothing short of a chaotic celebration. The Blitz Team had foregone the parade option for various reasons, settling instead on the more intimate idea of using a local resturaunt on the edge of the town near the Blitz Team`s home base to host a party composed of close friends and former opponents.   
  
The crowd that had gathered there was as varied and eclectic as the tournament itself had been. Members of virtually every significant or memorable team the Blitz had faced off with in the past were present, from both members of the Fluegel Team to the Fuzzy Pandas/Zaber Fangs/Sabre Tigers/Tigers Team to Vega Obscura and Stigma Stoller, everyone was gathered in celebration. Even then though, old rivalries played themselves out as Vega and Bit played a game of checkers against one another, practically ignorant of the toast that had just been made while Leena and Naomi tried to best one another repeatedly in every arcade game they could get their hands on, though it was probably the first time the two were actually _benign_ in their competition.   
  
Leon lowered his glass and gingerly took a sip, he`d never been one for alchohol but tonight was a rare exception to the rule. Brad Hunter did the same, as did most of the others present at the celebration. The tender, a grizzled looking fellow by the name of Harabec(though most everyone had come to nickname him 'Beck' for the evening) was actually having to strain to keep up with all of the orders, the others who worked there weren`t doing much better but they managed.   
  
As for the two 'stars' of the night?   
  
Bit and Vega were still deadlocked in a game of checkers. "Your move," Vega commented, sipping his drink through a straw. "I`m thinkin`, gimme a minute," Bit replied, taking a bite out of the thirteenth chili dog he`d ordered. Perhaps it wasn`t that odd but for some reason, Bit Cloud was impossible to fill up tonight. "I`ve given ya five, now make a move already you old git," Vega chided jokingly. "Ah shyeddap ya whipper shnapper," Bit replied, going along with it if only to get a kick out the way Vega blew half of his drink out of his nose and fell otu of his chair as a result.   
  
_ "Works everytime,"_ the new champion thought, taking a split second to cheaply switch around several pieces and give himself an advantage. By the time Vega had scraped himself off of the floor with the help of an over-attentive young woman with green hair by the name of Abbie, Bit had completed the trick, and calmly proceeded to move another of the game pieces as the younger opponent settled back into his chair.   
  
"Your move," Bit said with a nod. "Holy... Look over there! Dude! Leon just ripped Naomi`s top off!" Vega gaped. Bit, being the idiot savant he was, quietly did as Vega had yelled, giving the boy just enough time to rearrange the pieces once again in such a way that left them deadlocked like before, though this time Vega was intent on having just a _slight_ advantage. "No he didn`t," Bit mumbled, turning back towards the table to find the pieces rearranged again with Vega only smiling knowingly at him.   
  
_ "Dang..."   
  
"Like an open book,"_ Vega thought, practically saying it with his expression. _"Oh, like you`re much better?"_ Bit seemed to ask back with an expression or two of his own, focusing again on the game while Vega returned to sipping his drink.   
  
"**_I WON! I WON! AHAHAHAHAHA!!!_**"   
  
"Sounds like Leena finally got one on Naomi," Jamie commented monotonously. "And this surprises you?" Leon asked. "Five... Four..." Brad began to count down, taking another sip of his beer before beginning to eat. "Three... Two... One."   
  
"**_WHAT THE?!_**"   
  
"So much for that victory," Jamie and Brad said in unison. "And this surprises you?" Leon asked again in one of those 'what else is new?' voices. "Sounds like they got one heck of a rivalry," Beck commented, finally finding a few seconds to stand still and polish off a glass. "Oh, they try to kill each other every other week," Brad replied as if it was as simple as giving the weather. "... Yeah, that sounds like a heck of a rivalry," Beck said with a nod.   
  
Laughter shortly erupted through the resturaunt as Omari, one of the Zaber Fangs, attempted to breakdance - with the allowance of the staff of course - only to land with a crash on his head and stiffly fall over. If not for the fact he actually got up with a slightly dazed looking grin, most of the people would have thought he was hurt.   
  
Then there were those like Stigma, the Tasker Sisters, Jack Sisco and Pierce, all of whom had gathered up and were generally just monitoring the chaos with looks of amusement while playing cards or eating. It seemed Jack and Stigma had hit it off quite nicely, while the Tasker Sisters and Pierce had formed their own little card team and were presently busy racking up the wins on anyone who had the gall to play against them. If not for the benevolent nature of the party, a good many people would likely be leaving with their wallets empty.   
  
In fact, out of everyone present only a few people who could have or would have been there seemed to be missing. Chief among these were Steve Tauros, Oscar Hameros, Harry Champ and Sarah Obscura, the latter of which had a viable excuse given that she and virtually everyone else who had been affiliated with the Backdraft Group but Pierce, Stigma, Doctor Leyon and Vega were all in jail at present.   
  
Harry happened to be in the hospital, while nobody particularly knew where Oscar or Steve were.   
  
They`d all probably keel over if they did.   
  
  
Padre Medical Center, better known as 'that hospital for Zoid pilots.' Owned and operated by the Zoid Battle Commission, Padre Medical Center was a place where Doctor Steven Tauros had found himself several times before. Both of his children had been born here, his parents had given birth to him here, his wife, Rina, had regretfully died here and currently, this was the one place where he could settle an old score without that score running off somehow.   
  
Cracking open the hospital door and ignoring the flailing, still-slightly irate Harry Champ, who was presently frothing at the mouth that he`d lost his chance to propose to Leena at a parade or some other massive event. He was here for more serious reasons than to check up on his daughter`s favorite plaything.   
  
Stepping through the path between the dozen or so beds and finding himself greeted by a slightly overweight, reasonably muscled figure about his own height but a good bit wider, the Doc paused again. "Still smoking, eh, Oscar?" He asked, recieving a smirk in reply. "Hanging around Leyon on morphine after major surgery is enough to drive enough to smoke," Oscar stated with a shrug. "Ain`t _that_ the truth," Steve agreed wholeheartedly. "He awake yet?" He asked. "He was awake a little while ago, but the pain killers got to him again... Seems as though he got lucky this time," Oscar answered.   
  
"How bad was it?" Steve asked, grabbing a chair and pulling it up to the door. Oscar shook his head and took a drag from his cigarette before answering. "Internal bleeding from the stomach, ruptures on two or three internal organs, one of his kidneys might need to be removed, possibly a bit of damage to one of his testicles - " "That was a bit more than I needed to know." " - Four of his ribs and his collarbone are all cracked, he lost a few of his back teeth on the right side, black eye, nearly broke his nose, busted his forehead, got a third degree concussion, blew out an ear drum, broke an arm..."   
  
"... Jesus Oscar, how the hell is Leyon still alive?" Steve asked in disbelief. "He`s too stubborn to die, you know that probably better than me... Christ, I still remember the time you two put each other in the hospital over Rina," Oscar answered with a shake of the head.   
  
"Don`t remind me," Steven muttered annoyedly. "Yeah, he really bit the bullet this time. Leena okay?" Oscar asked. "Yeah, she got out of it without a scratch... I owe Leyon big time for this," Steve exclaimed gruffly. "Yeah. Wanna see if he`s awake now?" Oscar asked, snuffing his cigarette out on his thumb and dropping it into the ash tray beside him. "You _still_ do that?" Steve asked. "Old habits die hard, especially the filthy ones. Ready?"   
  
"As I`ll ever be."   
  
A few seconds passed and Oscar gently slid the door open, stepping inside the private room that they`d recently moved Leyon into and immediately turning towards the downed figure on the bed. Leyon was still out like a rock, though he was holding the remote with his good hand while his opposite arm was held up in a cast and sling above the bed. It wasn`t a pretty sight given he`d actually been uninjured enough to laugh a few hours earlier.   
  
"Keep your voice down," Oscar said as an after thought, stepping aside and allowing Steve in before shutting the door and glancing down at the unconcious scientific genius in the bed. "Worse than you described him," Doc muttered under his breath. "Want me to let you take over for the night so you can settle it in private when he wakes up?" Oscar asked. "No but you can go order us all something to eat - assuming they`ll let him," Steven answered, settling down into the recliner next to Leyon`s bed and kicking a leg up into his lap.   
  
It was going to be a long night, but that was okay with Oscar and Steven, all that was left was for Leyon to wake up.   
  
  
Another hour had passed as the party continued before finally dying down, ending with Brad having defeated the Tasker Sisters, Jack, Naomi and Leena all at cards, Bit and Vega having taken their checkers game to a new level by playing five at once with Bit somehow pulling a win off and everyone going home happy and a tad inebriated save for the aforementioned Brad Hunter.   
  
He had opted to stay behind and get something to eat while everyone else headed off. It`d been a choice made because of the simple reason that he hadn`t exactly finished his meal earlier before answering a challenge from the Tasker Sisters to play cards.   
  
Brad Hunter wasn`t a major gambling man, but he had the luck and skill of a pro at it, plus he had come to enjoy games of money, chance and skill during his days as a mercenary, a job he had recently left to pursue his career as a member of the Blitz Team, though he would likely take at least a temporary leave to join the Fluegel team during the next Royal Cup several years down the road.   
  
As it stood though, Brad had been a bit lazy tonight, ordering his food from the table he was at and idly shuffling cards while most of the staff had left for the night, leaving only Harabec to clean things upand cook up a breakfast dinner for his last customer of the night. He preferred to close things himself after all, Davids was a pretty understanding employer and most of his workers were local college students, leaving him to handle work during most of the day, which wasn`t a trouble given how light business usually was. For some reason though, the resturaunt always made just enough money to stay in business successfully.   
  
The doorbell jingled several times and a new figure entered. He was about the same height as Brad himself, probably a little taller, definately just as lanky though, and wearing a black pair of jeans with a matching long sleeved shirt and a dark blue vest, along with a black baseball cap. The figure bore a passive resemblance to Harabec, but he was obviously younger. "Hey! Beck! Abbie here?" The fellow called out. "No! She went home a few minutes ago!" Came the reply from the kitchen.   
  
"Damn," the newcomer grumbled, turning to leave before something caught his eye.   
  
"Gambling man?" He asked. "From time to time," Brad answered. "You?" He asked a few seconds afterward, shuffling the cards patiently. "Every chance I get. I`m Marcus by the way, you?" The newcomer asked, introducing himself and pulling up a chair. "Brad," the Blitz Team member answered coolly, leaned back a bit in his seat. "How big a gambler are you?" Brad asked. "I`ve bet ownership of my Gustav before, you?"   
  
"Usually small bets but I`m on a roll tonight... Say I bet you ownership of my Zoid against yours?" Brad asked. "What Zoid you got?" Marcus replied, leaning forward. "The Shadow Fox."   
  
Marcus seemed to pause in disbelief. "Brad Hunter?"   
  
"One and only."   
  
"You`re on. I always wanted to try my hand at Zoid battling," Marcus replied with a competitive smirk, scooting right up to the table. "Shuffle up and set down the cards," he ordered, taking his cap off and setting it onto the table. "With pleasure. Hope your job doesn`t need a Zoid," Brad smirked. "I`m quittin` if I win or lose anyway, Zoid trucking is a good paying job but I need something with better pay... Like the wins from Zoid battles."   
  
"Lemme guess," Brad smugly paused, setting down the shuffled up deck onto the table and continuing. "She`s named Abbie, dark green hair, pale complexion, nice build, works here as a waitress, attends a local college and has a severe distaste of Zoid pilots," he deduced. "You a stalker?" Marcus asked wearily. "No, just good at reading people. She didn`t exactly hold a lot of love for us when she was serving earlier and the college thing is a lucky guess since most of the people who work here seem to attend one or another and knew her better than an on-the-job acquaintance," Brad answered. "Pays to be good at reading people when you`re a merc," he added.   
  
"Well, after you," Marcus offered. The game began in earnest shortly afterward.   
  
"Did I mention she kept mumbling about her 'Markie?'"   
  
"... Just shut up and deal already."   
  


_ End Prologue  
  


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**Author`s Note:** Full A/N next chapter. 


	2. The Challenge and the Tragedy, Leyons So...

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I don`t own Zoids. Do own the OCs in this story though.  
  


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**New Age  
** The Challenge and the Tragedy - Leyon`s Sorrows   
  
  
  


Monotone thuds filled the room. It had been one day since the Blitz Team had emerged as the victors of Class S, and this morning was obviously the proof that just because they`d effectively surpassed any and all of their former challengers for the time being, the Blitz Team still had it`s failings and they had them in spades. It was so obvious because at present, the newly Class S team was mostly gathered around watching one of their own act in an extremely uncharacteristic fashion.   
  
More monotone thuds, until Bit spoke up. "Brad, stop or you`ll break the table," he advised cautiously. A groan and another series of thuds followed in response. "What happened?" Leena asked while entering the living room, sipping off of lukewarm coffee and staring at Brad in bemusement. Brad paused and sat up straight, robotically turning his head to view Leena and timing himself perfectly. With any luck, his announcement would cause her to choke, cough, possibly gag or at the worst, blow her coffee out of her nose in laughter.   
  
"I lost the Shadow Fox in a game of cards," he stated dryly. Exactly as planned, Leena keeled over, spewing coffee out of her nose and choking loudly. Brad turned back to the table and resumed smacking his head into it over and over again. "Did you sign a legal document on it?" Jamie asked with concern, taking a seat across from Brad. "No, worse... Roadies` honor," Brad answered, craning his head back extra far this time and slamming it back into the table with the sound of a crack as Brad`s skull contacted the wood once again, leaving a noticable dent this time around.   
  
"Smooth move Brad," Bit commented sourly. "Good thing the Doc isn`t here yet... And we still don`t know where the heck he is," Jamie grumbled annoyedly with a shake of the head. "This sucks," Brad thought aloud, still thumping his forehead into the table at least once every three seconds. "Giving yourself a concussion won`t make it better," Bit reminded him. "Sure it will. Maybe I`ll forgot where I am, move to the Sheed Islands and start smoking opium rectally," Brad replied. "... Okay, _that_ is a visual I _did not_ need to think of," Jamie cringed. "Did I mention I`ll do it while wearing _pink_ knackers with Leena`s underwear draped over my head while orally servicing someone called Noise Marine Bubba?"   
  
"... I`m just gonna go die of disgust now," Jamie shuddered, an action followed by Bit and Leena, the latter of whom was just beginning to scrape herself off of the floor. "Joy... And I didn`t even get to the part about prancing gayly across the open sea with my life mate, Big G-" "**_ENOUGH BRAD!_** We get the point, jeez," Bit interrupted for the sake of the food he`d eaten last night. "No. You don`t, that Zoid is my _life_ Bit, if I can`t use it, what use am I to the team and what point is winning the bet with Naomi for the next Royal Cup?" Brad asked annoyedly, smacking his head into the table once again.   
  
"Well... When`s this Marcus guy supposed to be here? And does he know we haven`t even finished repairing the Shadow Fox yet?"   
  
"Any second now and yes," Brad answered, smacking his forehead into the table once more. As if on cue, the doorbell rang through the intercom of the base, making itself most apparent right in the living room. "So much for my Zoid career..."   
  
"Will you shut up? I have an idea..."   
  
"Meaning?"   
  
"I`ll fight him for rights to ownership of your Zoid," Bit announced sternly. "... Well, if not for the fact he`ll likely rip all of the Shadow Fox`s legs off and then behead it, I`d almost say that`s a good idea," Jamie stated. Brad soberly glanced up from the table, twitching slightly. "Go for it," he ordered before the resumation of table against forehead.   
  
"Alright then... Anyone care to tag along while I issue my challenge?"   
  
"Sure," Jamie replied. Leena only glared at the numerous stains on her pajamas and Brad simply continued banging his forehead into the table. "Come on then," Bit said with a grimace, darting out of the living room and heading towards the hangar. He and Jamie arrived in all of a quarter of a minute, passing by the downed hulk of the Fox and the trashed remains of the Gunsniper, right up to the garage door, which Jamie lazily opened by smacking a seemingly random button near the door.   
  
They were greeted by the same scruffy looking individual that Brad had lost to the night before, accompanied by a custom painted Gustav that had the shell as the same extremely dark blue color as the vest he wore, while the parts that were normally gray had been redone as a dull black. The last noticable additions were that this Gustav had _teeth_, namely two automated looking machine guns - one on each side - with a good firing arc in any direction.   
  
"You the guy who beat Brad in a card game?" Bit asked, stepping outside into the morning light. "Yeah, Marcus Harlock," Marcus stated, extending a hand. "Bit Cloud," Bit replied, shaking the other`s hand before pointing over at the still pajama-wearing Jamie. "And that`s Jamie Hameros. Here for the Fox, I`m guessing?" Bit asked. Marcus gave a nod. "I don`t want any trouble but I _did_ win it so..."   
  
"No problem... But since you seem so intent on having it, how about we raise the stakes a little?"   
  
"Eh?"   
  
"You in the Shadow Fox against me in the Liger Zero. If I win, Brad gets the Fox back, if you win, you keep it," Bit explained simply. "Works for me, I guess," Marcus said with a shrug. "You`d need to give me a week to finish my registration and the repairs on the Fox though," he added. "Fine by me, just saves us money in the long run... Vega did one heck of a number on it."   
  
"I don`t mind," Marcus replied, motioning with his thumb back at the Gustav. "I just need to finish setting myself up. Already got a basic pair of trailers but I`m tradin` `em in pretty soon for something better suited to carrying and maintaining a Zoid," he stated. "Offhand, go for the MWS-90," Bit advised. "Eh?" Marcus asked. "I`m an ex-parts dealer, MWS-90s are the best out there you can easily afford right now," Bit explained.   
  
"I`ll think on it. Mind helpin` me load the Fox up?" Marcus asked. "You can use the loading equipment, no big deal," Bit shrugged before stepping off to the side. "Thanks again," Marcus said, certain the other hadn`t heard him before turning around and darting back to the Gustav. Climbing into the cockpit, it wasn`t long before Marcus had commandeered one of the loading cranes and brought the slightly disgruntled seeming Shadow Fox up onto the trailer, dropping it down before getting back out and personally undoing everything.   
  
Fox didn`t exactly like him though, as evidenced by the gnashing of it`s jaws when he first started undoing the loading pieces. "Ease up big guy, I`m not your owner," Marcus explained, casually ducking between the Shadow Fox`s jaws and undoing the cable from around it`s neck. "Just your new partner!" He cheerily stated, patting the Fox on the back of the head and gleefully avoiding a swipe from it`s remaining forepaw. "We`ll have you fixed up in no time!" He stated just as cheerfully, climbing down from the trailer in avoidance of the Shadow Fox`s teeth before casually opening the manual locking controls. "How high?" He asked.   
  
Fox shrieked at him. "`Kay, too high... How`s that?" He asked. Fox shrieked again. "Here?" Marcus asked a third time, resetting the magnetic holding mechanisms of the trailer for the third time in a row. Fox stopped growling and seemingly resigned itself to fate`s mechanations, flopping it`s head down on the trailer and letting out the mechanical equivelent of a whimper. "Ah don`t gimme any o` that, you`re tougher. You`d be bitching and whining if you weren`t," Marcus grumbled, walking casually around the Gustav and climbing back into the cockpit before pulling out of the hangar, only to stop at the entranceway and glance around for Bit and Jamie.   
  
Both of them were standing in plain sight at the controls for the garage door. "See you in a week, Bit Cloud!" Marcus shouted with a wave before the cockpit glass slid shut and the Gustav drove off, dragging along one trailer with the Shadow Fox in it and a second loaded up with an oversized cargo container. He apparently hadn`t quit his day job yet.   
  
"And I thought you were weird," Jamie mumbled dryly, pressing the button to shut the garage door. "You aren`t one to talk, mister Wild Eagle," Bit chided in response, turning back towards the Liger and grinning ear to ear. "Hey Liger!" He shouted. The Zoid roared once in response and seemed to tilt it`s head to get a good look at him. "Ready to get Brad`s Zoid back!?" Bit asked. The hangar rattled violently as the Liger roared it`s response.   
  
"I`ll take that as a yes," Bit grinned. "... You`re both weird," Jamie shrugged. "Like I said, you aren`t one to talk Wild Eagle," Bit retorted. "Don`t joke about that!" Jamie yelled.   
  
  
An hour and a half later, Marcus pulled the Gustav up to one of the dozen or so local Zoid maintenance shops and climbed out, a list of repair needs in hand, along with the service form for the parts and ammo he had delivered with his Zoid and the required paperwork to make a trade-in of his two Zoid tow trailers. Mark wasn`t exactly a pro, he was only nineteen, but he was the type to come prepared when he could, and since this was such an occasion that`s exactly what he did.   
  
Walking around the width of the Gustav, he wasn`t too keen on leaving the downed Zoid behind even if only for a little while. "How ya holdin` up Fox?" Mark asked, calmly deactivating the locking mechanisms on both trailers before stepping back over to the Zoid and waiting for an answer. The eyes of the Fox seemed to regard him like a sniper regarding a target, and the Zoid 'said' nothing. "I`ll just go out on a limb and guess that the glare means you`ve been better. No offense taken," Mark replied to the silence, turning around and starting to walk away. "Don`t worry though, you`ll be good as new by the end of the week. Probably better in fact," Mark stated before speed walking towards the door and darting into the shop.   
  
He was greeted instantly by the weighted stink of rubber and deactivated explosives, as well as the sound of welding torches, saws, cranes and virtually anything else that could be used on a Zoid in the distance. The ceiling was easily thrice the height of a typical Zoid, probably taller, and it was obvious that the place had probably once been a warehouse.   
  
Stepping off balance for a few seconds before shaking the heavy odors out of his senses for a short while, Harlock closed the distance over to the counter and tapped the bell for someone to come, doing so several times since the foul air was actually starting to get to him. He hadn`t ever been one for heavy odors, even a slightly heavy perfume had the potential to make him anything from lightheaded to queasy. "And you are?" A middle aged woman with dark auburn hair that was starting to turn a little gray at parts answered the bell. She looked like she`d had one heck of a long day already.   
  
"Marcus Harlock, here for the parts delivery _and_ I need my Zoid repaired and modified," Marcus stated with a nod, setting down the papers for both transactions. "`Bout time one of the haulers showed up," the woman griped annoyedly. "Something going on that I should know about?" Mark asked with a quirk of a brow. "You`re the only one of seven shipments that`s had the damn decency to show up," the woman answered grouchily. "... That`s odd," Marcus commented surprisedly.   
  
"Yeah, you travel on the backroads or something?"   
  
"Yeah, safer that way," Marcus admitted. "Figures. All the others were guys I knew, slackers always took the main roads," the woman stated with audible annoyedness. "... These are some odd modifications you`re orderin` son," the woman mused as she read over the list of equipment that he wanted replaced, added or enhanced.   
  
"Not to mention the repair bills... Sweet Jesus kid, you`re nuts if you think you can pay for all this as is," she muttered in disbelief. "All payment from the transport bill goes to repairs, royalty charges and whats left to modifications and if I have to I can trade in one of my trailers to finish it up," Mark replied almost automatically. "Tight squeeze but I think it can be done," the woman sighed. "Got your head set on battling, eh?" She asked. "Better pay than transporting," Marcus replied with a shrug. "Only if you win," she shot back. "Then I`ll just win a lot. I can`t really afford to lose," Mark stated firmly. "Then for your sake I hope you don`t," the woman mumbled.   
  
"Now then... Let`s see if you got all of this right..."   
  
"Go ahead."   
  
"Dual Shot Impact Cannon, concealable in the chest-region?"   
  
"Yep."   
  
"Variable smoke projectors?"   
  
"Yep."   
  
"Concealable boost thrusters in the back legs?"   
  
"Yep."   
  
"Increased audio and optics?"   
  
"Yep."   
  
"New Strike Laser Claw systems... Yadda yadda, blah blah bl-hold up."   
  
"What?"   
  
"I`m not sure if it`s legal for a competitor in Zoid battles to be usin` an auxilliary combat system," the woman stated uncertainly. "Well, if it is. If not you can take that off the list," Marcus replied. "Alright. That should be about it... Oh, and the turret?"   
  
"360*/180* degrees of movement, feeding right off the main power supply," Marcus advised on how to change around the 30mm Laser Vulcan Gun. Doctor Leyon would likely be having a conniption if he knew what was being done to 'his baby.'   
  
  
And speaking of Leyon...   
  
"I think he`s starting to wake up," Steve said with a yawn. "Took `im long enough," Oscar replied with a similar yawn. "Always was a pansy when it came to medication," he mused jokingly. "Better to be a pansy than a semi-disabled twit," Leyon managed to get out while trying to work his eyes open. "Now now, Leyon... Don`t worry, you might be disabled too!" Oscar joked with a bit of bittersweetness to it. Few could understand the morbid sense of humor the Big Three(a joke that evolved over the stature that all three seemed to have) bore around one another.   
  
"Remind me not to try and be a hero again," Leyon groaned, trying to get at an itch on his side. Oscar did the honors, casually grabbing a fork and using it to scratch at Leyon`s skin/annoy the living hell out of him in the same moment. "Ah, come on Leyon, it wasn`t that bad... Heck, I owe you," Steven exclaimed. "You aren`t the one lying in a hospital bed with a bruised left nut and too many injuries to count," Leyon griped. "True. But you get the idea," Steve conceded. "So... Why ya here Steven? Come to finish me off or something?"   
  
"Nope."   
  
"Come to talk me out of my revenge on you?"   
  
"Nope."   
  
"Then why in the blue hell are you here?" The pointy headed evil genius asked in a daze, glancing sideways at Steve. It was a miracle he didn`t need a cast or anything on his neck, that was probably one of the only parts of his body that had mostly escaped injury aside from bruising. "To tell you the truth about it."   
  
"I already know the truth," Leyon hoarsely bit out. "No Leyon, you don`t. None of this was my fault," Steven explained with a shake of the head. He didn`t even need to explain what he was trying to clear, the subject was so sensitive that both knew what the other was talking about instantly. "You took her away from me Steven, I can`t forgive you for that," Leyon growled, visibly having to blink back tears.   
  
"I know. I don`t mind," Doctor Tauros replied. "I just want you to know the truth."   
  
"Why`s that? Not like it`ll make a difference," Leyon muttered.   
  
"Because, the truth can set you free," Steve quoted. "You always were a sucker for philosophy when nobody was looking," Leyon almost chuckled, holding back to keep from hurting himself. "Well... Do you want to hear or not?"   
  
"The better question is whether or not I have a choice in the matter," Leyon replied, shifting his gaze whistfully towards the window. "No, not really," Oscar shrugged. "Figured as much... Go ahead, I`ll try not to scream since my entire body feels like hell," Leyon ordered, leaning his head back onto the bed and shutting his eyes.   
  
"Well... You know it started with you asking me to write that letter, right?" Steven asked.   
  
"Yeah. How could I not?"   
  
"I asked Oscar to do it since I`m not good with that stuff either," Steven explained.   
  
"And I thought it was from him to Rina so..."   
  
"Great. In other words one of you is just an idiot, the other is a completely clueless moron and I can`t tell which is which."   
  
"And neither can we, what else is new?" Oscar asked. Leyon chuckled gravely, wiping his eyes carefully and speaking up hoarsely. "Nothing really. Surprised it was that simple..."   
  
"I`m sorry Leyon," Steven said. "I know. I don`t care though, I`ll just get revenge over you some other way... All I have to live for these days anyway," Leyon said with the tone of someone who`s spirit had finally been broken.   
  
"Feel free to resume being an absolute sociopath at any time," Oscar suggested, trying to break the heavy silence that had fallen over the room.   
  
"Hey... Oscar," Leyon began. "Think you could go pick me up some Ramen noodles?" He asked. "Sure, what kind?" Oscar asked. "Anything that ain`t beef flavored," Leyon answered. "Will do," Oscar said, catching the message hidden between the lines and under the surface. Standing up and shaking his legs out, Oscar calmly made his way out of the room, shutting the door in his wake and letting the other two be alone.   
  
It was really all he could do.   
  
"Were you being honest just now?" Steven asked. "About the revenge?" Leyon asked. "Yes."   
  
"To the core. All I have left to live for is to somehow outdo or defeat you, even if it`s only once. Doesn`t matter how long it takes, I`ll do it and then I`ll die."   
  
"Leyon..."   
  
"Don`t 'Leyon' me," the bedridden scientist ordered, breaking into a brief coughing fit. "My life`s been on a downward spiral since the day I asked you to do that love letter," he grimaced. "I waited and I waited, I watched as you and Rina got together, I even grit my teeth and stood in as one of the best men at the wedding and I held back my tears when your son was born," he began to explain. "Everyday I watched the love of my life slip further and further out of my grasp and then came the day I came to visit and the accident happened."   
  
"Don`t remind me," Steven ordered. He still remember how Rina had incurred her injuries with frightening clarity. "I won`t. You aren`t the only one who breaks down in the memory of that, remember?" Leyon asked. "But anyway... After that... After that I watched her die in this very hospital. I stood by while you were busy trying to comfort Leon and your daughter, I tried to provide some comfort to her even though she was unconcious up to just before the end and I fought back suicidal urges for years afterward. Know why?" He asked.   
  
"Why?" Steven hesitated, leaning back uneasily in the recliner.   
  
"Because her last words were 'I love you both,'" Leyon stated. Steven felt his stomach tighten up drastically. "Yeah. My patience only got me that, she admitted she had feelings for me but in the end you still won because she cared for you just as much," Leyon explained, staring up at the ceiling and trying to blink away the stinging in his eyes.   
  
"After that, all I had left was my revenge," Leyon finished. "You understand now, don`t you? Even if it was Oscar`s screw-up, I _have_ to have my revenge on you," Leyon bit out. "Yes. I understand," Steven replied with a sigh. "Maybe someday when this is over we`ll be able to kick back like we used to and watch a battle," he mused. "Maybe. I doubt I`ll live to see it though," Leyon replied. "Well, since you can`t escape," Steven swiped the remote from the bedstand on the other side of Leyon`s bed. "What channel?" He asked with a slow smirk.   
  
"Steven, you son of a bitch," Leyon muttered, almost laughing in the process.   
  
  
_ "Where are we going?"_ He asked groggily as Jamie sped through the desert towards the nearby town. "To find Doc," Jamie replied a few seconds later. _"Joy,"_ the Wild Eagle sarcastically muttered. "Not my fault you aren`t devoted to your friends off the battlefield," Jamie commented annoyedly. _"Our friends Jamie, and yes, it is, because it`s your fault that you aren`t devoted to them enough on the battlefield,"_ the Wild Eagle retorted. "Just shut up already," Jamie grumbled. _"Being quiet without beating the snot out of someone is beyond me,"_ the Wild Eagle replied. "It figures," Jamie thought. "Just why are you coming out again?"   
  
_ "Because it gets boring as hell back there, why else?"   
  
_ "... Bullcrap, there`s another reason," Jamie replied, adjusting the mirror on the windshield and sparing a glance at the surrounding terrain. _"And you think I`m the psycho here?"_ The second personality asked.   
  
"... You`re a non-existent sub-personality inherited through some backwards genetic trait from my dad who I listen to on a once-a-day basis at the least. We`re both nuts," Jamie replied fatalistically. _"Oh ye of li`l faith,"_ the other replied sarcastically, mimicking a Scottish accent in the process. "Is that a Gustav up there?" Jamie asked. "I have no idea, my eyes are only as good as your`s in this position," the Wild Eagle replied. "Well... Looks like a Gustav but I`m not sure," Jamie commented, pressuring the gas pedal a bit more and accelerating towards it.   
  
_ "Is that uh... Crap, whatshisface?"_ The Wild Eagle asked. "Mark?" Jamie asked. _"Yeah, him,"_ the Wild Eagle replied. "Not sure, can`t really make out any details on that Gustav at this distance," Jamie replied.   
  
Jamie never saw the red dot leading in front of his jeep.   
  
He probably saw the explosion that threw the vehicle into a rolling flip, but it was likely that he was unconcious before he could register anything else.   
  


_ End Chapter One  
  


* * *

  
  
_

**Author`s Note:** And so begins New Age... Don`t worry folks, the chapters will get longer and other characters _will_ get involved. I`m not letting any of the characters out of the spotlight for _too_ long, just need to establish everything :P  
  
_Sh33p_ out. 


	3. Cruel Intentions of the Wild Eagle

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I don`t own Zoids.  
  


* * *

  
  


** New Age**  
Cruel Intentions of the Wild Eagle   
  
  
  


"Look, he`s finally wakin` up," a gruff, intimidating voice sounded amusedly as Jamie opened his eyes. It felt like someone had just smacked him in the face with a lead pipe, and thanks to Leena`s frequent quasi-psychosis, he actually knew what that felt like. "Where am I?" Jamie asked. "On the highway to Hell," the voice replied. Jamie felt a hard kick move right into the small of his back, and almost convulsed to try and shield it, only to finally realize that his hands were bound in extremely tight shackles. "You should let me go," Jamie advised, feeling for his alter-ego. The Wild Eagle was either recovering or trying to gather itself up for something big.   
  
Jamie knew this for the simple reason that he tended to be the same whenever the Wild Eagle was in control and something bad was happening. Whichever personality had gone submissive tended to be far weaker for however long is was allowing the other to take control, and Jamie usually had to really fight to wrestle control away when the Wild Eagle took over.   
  
"And why should we do that?" The man asked, stepping around and in front of Jamie with a grin. He was big and imposing, Jamie could tell the fellow could likely kill him in a matter of seconds if he wanted. The room seemed to rock briefly. "You`re worth a lot to the Blitz Team after all, and since they just won the Royal Cup, they can probably pay _quite_ a bit to get you back," he stated. "So really... Why should we let ya go, eh?" He asked, leaning forward with a grin.   
  
"Because if you don`t, you`ll all die," Jamie said in a voice that oddly seemed both his own and someone else`s, eyes seeming distant and conflicted for a moment or two. The man seemed to cringe slightly and stood up straight, looking a little scared before kicking Jamie again, right in the stomach. The teen coughed briefly and rolled over, just as the room seemed to shake again.   
  
"Hey Walt! This little idiot thinks he`s gonna kill us all if we don`t let `im go!" The man stated with false amusement after tapping one of the walls. Jamie remained silent after that, taking in the scenery and trying to figure out where he was.   
  
_ "Just had to promise that, didn`t you?"_ He asked. _"Watch me succeed too."   
  
"Over our dead body."   
  
"... Heh..."   
  
_ Jamie stopped thinking after that, only listening to the Wild Eagle`s cryptic chuckling. He hated it when the other personality was right.   
  
  
Leyon and Steven were still watching the same program as a Zoid battle raged across the television. A young veteran by the name of Kyle Mazemia was currently taking it to another young veteran by the name of Rayth Takahori, an aerial duel that scarcely seemed to fit into the designation of Class B.   
  
"Ever notice how they get more and more vicious with every generation?" Leyon asked. "Not so much as vicious... I think they just seem to learn from those before them better than we did," Steve replied, kicking his feet up on the unused edge of the bed after sliding his loafers off. "True... If not for the accident, how much ya wanna bet that Oscar could wipe the floor with both of them?" Leyon asked with barely veiled amusement.   
  
"I wouldn`t really say he would wipe the floor with them..."   
  
"Why not?"   
  
"This is Oscar we`re talking about, Leyon. Do you honestly think there`d be anything left to wipe the floor _with_?" Doctor Tauros asked.   
  
"... Yeah, valid point there. Oscar always was a total lunatic when it came to his matches. Probably why he had the accident," Leyon replied. "Shame too, he`d probably still be the Class S solo champion if he had just used a bit of caution," Steve mused. "Well, he went out with a bang I guess... How many people can claim knocking off a four year streak of wins on a guy good enough to get in with an unmodified Rev Raptor for the championship?"   
  
"Yeah... I think Jamie might be able to take his father`s place as a champion some day, assuming he can conquer the Wild Eagle the way Oscar did," Steve commented, watching as Mazemia`s Griffin dove down past the Black Stormsworder of the other pilot, arcing up off of the ground at the last second only to go tumbling out of control briefly as a number of rounds tore into it`s backside. "I doubt it. I only met the kid a few times but given how he saw what went down..." Leyon shook his head.   
  
"Guess so... That reminds me, there a phone in here?" Tauros asked. "Over there," Leyon motioned with his free hand. "Checkin` up on your daughter?" Leyon asked. "You need to stop reading my mind," Steve grumbled with a smirk. "Well maybe if you weren`t so blaringly obvious," Leyon countered. It was a rare moment of comradery between the two old friends-turned-rivals.   
  
  
"Oh... Hi Dad," Leena said, holding the phone on her shoulder while pouring a drink. "No, Brad, Bit and I are the only ones here right now," she replied calmly, attempting to avoid mentioning Brad`s little problem for the duration. "Jamie went to go find you actually. Where are you anyhow?" Leena asked, setting the drink back into the fridge and walking back into the living room with a grimace. "Oh... How is he?" Leena asked. "That bad, huh?"   
  
Stepping past Brad, who was still busy holding a conversation with the table by forehead-based morse code, Leena settled down onto the couch and continued speaking. "Sounds pretty serious... Is he concious or... Ah. No, Bit`s busy working on fixing the Liger Jaeger armor. Why? Uh... Well... Hm..."   
  
_ "Ten seconds to core meltdown,"_ Brad thought sourly.   
  
"Oh no, it`s nothing... Well, ya see, Bit`s challenged this new guy named Marcus Harlock because he... Well... I`ll let Brad tell you," Leena excused, shoving the phone into Brad`s ear. "Say it," she ordered with that moderately psychotic look on her face.   
  
"I lost the Shadow Fox last night in a card game."   
  
The phone promptly crackled and the only sound audible for around thirty seconds was Doctor Tauros` screaming and ranting, soon joined by a slightly irate Leyon.   
  
"Yeah. That about sums it up," Brad mumbled, calmly pushing the phone away and resuming the thumping of his forehead into the table. Again. "So there you have it," Leena said, casually sitting back down. "Oh... Brad`s taking it well aside from the fact he`ll probably snap the living room table if he keeps smacking his face into it. I wouldn`t worry too much, Bit`ll probably pull out another win like he did against Vega."   
  
"Fa la la la..." Brad mumbled, drawing back and roughly slamming his forehead into the table one last time. There table didn`t break. "That was just Brad knocking himself out, nothing too serious," Leena stated. "I`ll let you go now, tell Doctor Leyon I said to get well soon. Alright, love you too, bye." Leena tapped the button to turn the phone off and then set it back down on the table with a grimace. "I hope for your sake Bit wins, Brad... Otherwise Leyon and Dad _both_ are gonna castrate you with a wet wooden spoon," Leena mused, getting back up and walking out of the room, absently leaving her drink behind.   
  
  
"Haven`t been attacked yet..." Mark mumbled to himself, looking around the barren wasteland around him. Perhaps it was because his Gustav wasn`t dragging along two cargo containers like those that had gone missing, but he didn`t put too much thought into that. He didn`t need cargo right now, after all, the fact he had the magnetic systems on either towing trailer turned up to the maximum and a loaded shotgun was settled firmly into the seat beside his own pretty clearly demonstrated his intentions at the moment.   
  
"Did I get the right directions here or did they vanish farther down the road?" He asked himself, checking the scanner again with a bemused expression. Marcus had been expecting an attack by now, Gustavs weren`t exactly fighting Zoids but since the economy of the world rode around on their heavily armored hides and their Zoid cores had a reputation as being tough and easily removed and adapted to others, it was only logical that if there was someone trying to stop shipments of supplies to and from the town, they would try to attack a lone Gustav.   
  
"Maybe it`s the paint scheme..."   
  
Marcus paused.   
  
"... Forgot about the two machine guns I got on this thing," he muttered to himself, smacking his forehead only to fling sideways and almost out of his seat a split second later as an explosion rocked the side of the Gustav`s thick hide. "Was wondering when they`d attack," he thought aloud, calmly checking the scanner, zooming out on it once and then a second time. "Damn, a cloak user..."   
  
Another explosion smacked the hull of the Gustav, and briefly a spec was visible on the scanner. Marcus zoomed in, biding his time since the sniper had miscalculated and put himself too high up to get an easy shot on the wheels or the cockpit. "Just pull that trigger one more time..." Marcus begged, swerving the Gustav onto an offroad course in the direction of the gunshots.   
  
The third shot smacked into the Gustav just above the cockpit. Dead ahead.   
  
"You sir, are an idiot," Marcus said quietly, pounding the accelerator right into the floor with his right foot and using his left to try and root himself while leaning back in the seat. "Not just any idiot either," he mused, watching as his attacker`s cloak flittered in against the background in front or behind him, seeming to go straight up before spiralling through the air. "But an owned idiot at that," he stated, hitting the breaks and feeling the telltale ***THUMP*** as his would-be attacker found himself pinned down to the first trailer by the magnetic locking mechanism.   
  
"A righteously owned idiot no less," Marcus insulted again, bringing the Gustav to a complete stop and opening up the cockpit. Grabbing the shotgun and climbing back out, the lanky young man idly walked around the way of the Gustav and shook the weapon by the handle underlining the large barrel, promptly taking hold of the grip a few seconds and raising the weapon up to aim. "Come out with your hands up!" He ordered as the magnetics of the trailer shorted out the cloak to reveal a lightly modified Gunsniper that had two extra sniper rifle-type guns set forward in a similar manner to the larger gattlings on Leena Tauros` Gunsniper.   
  
"I`ll give you one more chance! Out, **_NOW!_**" Marcus ordered loudly, stepping forward and rounding the way between the first trailer and the Gustav, ducking under the thick cable that bound the trailer to his Zoid and coming out from between them facing the cockpit of the pinned Gunsniper. He could now see that the two moveable head-spines present on the typical Gunsniper were missing from this one, replaced instead by two small disc-like objects running parallel to one another on thin antennae behind the head.   
  
Both objects promptly snapped off and the Gunsniper struggled in vein to get up, it`s cloaking mechanism literally broken off. "Alright, have it your way," Marcus grumbled, raising the barrel of the shotgun a little higher and firing off a warning round. He never used buckshot, just solid slugs and the occasional explosive round. Common practice among Gustav transporters, thieves and the like tended to be less trouble when you could blow out the limbs of most extremely small or weak Zoids or outright kill someone trying to hold you up.   
  
The effect was the same either way though, the thick orange glass of the cockpit cracked under the pressure of the round, chipping away lightly at the impact point. It wasn`t much really, but given how Marcus aimed in the exact same spot a second later and took a second shot, it began to add up. The second slug pounded into the first, expanding the cracks and weakening the glass a bit further. He hesitated on the third shot though, lowering the weapon and giving the barrel grip a pump before raising it again.   
  
"My next shot is an explosive round, open the cockpit or eat shrapnel!" Marcus warned once more, settling his aim on the exact center of the cracking, right for the first two slugs that had been stopped by the glass. "Five seconds!" He warned.   
  
The glass opened up before he even got to start counting. A stocky looking man in his early thirties stood inside, hands held high, obviously having trouble standing since he was wearing a metal-laced armored jacket. "Step out of the Zoid, _now_," Marcus ordered, keeping the gun aimed right at the man. The other simply smirked.   
  
And that was when Marcus felt the cold steel of a pistol press into the back of his neck.   
  
"How about _you_ put _your_ gun down instead?" A new voice questioned from behind. "I`d rather not," Marcus quipped monotonously. "Too bad. Drop it," the short man in the cockpit ordered. "You value your partner`s life?" Marcus asked. No reply. "If you pull that trigger, you`ll cause a death or paralyzation reflex, and I`ll kill him as a result," he stated coldly. "He`s wearing armor, you twit," the guy behind him stated impatiently. "Armor that doesn`t cover his face from an explosive shotgun round," Mark replied calmly. "Drop him Tom!" The one in the cockpit yelled.   
  
"Yanno..." Marcus trailed off, lowering his aim significantly. "I could always shoot him in the groin and let him bleed to death instead," he commented offhandedly. "_**KILL `IM!!!**_" The man in the cockpit begged frantically. "Or maybe I could just drop you like a bad habit," the fellow identified as Tom suggested. "You really need better threats," Marcus commented sarcastically.   
  
"Blow me," Tom grumbled. "Okay," Marcus stated cheerfully, suddenly falling down to his knees and slinging the shotgun back and up, right into Tom`s chin. "Consider yourself _**BLOWN!**_" Marcus yelled, pulling the trigger and closing his eyes. Tom`s body landed several seconds later, followed by the stocky fellow screaming and keeling over in pained shock as his newly deceased comrade put a bullet into his knee and the magnetic pull of his armored jacket, yanking him out of the cockpit and dropping him onto the trailer harshly before punning him there.   
  
Mark slowly got to his feet, sorely shaking his legs out. "Remind me not to try and slide on my knees like that again," he said to himself, taking a look over his shoulder at the downed form of Tom. His face was effectively gone from the chin up, and what was left had warped around the trail of a small explosion. His hand was reflexively clutching to the gun hard enough that it had broken the trigger mechanism, his other hand, and the rest of him, lay in the sand. Permanently.   
  
"... I hate doing that," Mark cringed to himself, turning back to the other and walking up to the trailer, setting the shotgun down on it`s surface and climbing up onto it before walking over towards the groaning, teary eyed fellow. "Where`s your base of operations?" Marcus asked. "**_MY LEG`S BEEN BLOWN OUT MAN! WHAT THE HELL KINDA QUESTION IS THAT?!_**" The fellow asked in a rage. "Ain`t my fault your partner was an idiot, now where`s the base? Or do you want me to let you sit there bleeding while I take you to the police in town?" He asked sternly.   
  
"A mile East," the man grit out. "Good. Now, I`ll be nice and give you a choice: Want me to take you to town for medical attention or let you go and leave your fate in your own hands?" Mark asked. "Lemme go!" The other replied. "Alright," Marcus shrugged, reaching down and roughly yanking open the armored jacket and roughly dragging the man out of it before flinging him off the side of the trailer. "What about my Zoid?!"   
  
"I`m confiscating this damn thing to pawn it to a junk shop later," Marcus replied, allowing the other to tumble down into the sand and then hopping down, dragging the shotgun off with him. "You can`t leave me here!" The other yelled. "What about the reward for me?"   
  
"There isn`t a bounty on you, your gang is obviously unknown. Not worth it there, and what about the pilots of the Gustavs you took out before I freight trained you?" Marcus asked calmly, stepping back around the Gustav. "Besides, I told you I was letting you decide your own fate. You picked the choice, not me," he stated, setting the safety on the shotgun and lazily chucking it into the still-open shotgun.   
  
"**_YOU CAN`T LEAVE ME OUT HERE!!!_**"   
  
"I`ll tell your boss you said 'hi!'" Marcus shouted, climbing into the cockpit and tapping the button to shut it before pressing the pedal to accelerate again. Mark didn`t exactly _like_ leaving injured people out in the desert miles from civilization, but the guy _did_ try to kill him and likely _did_ kill more than a few other pilots before him so it wasn`t exactly like he hadn`t asked for it. Karma and all that.   
  
"Best be on the look out," he reminded himself, setting the scanner to the maximum zoom-out and keeping an eye to it frequently.   
  
  
_ "Just give me control Jamie, I don`t want to have to overwhelm you for it... Or let you get us almost killed."   
  
"If I do, then what?"   
  
"Then I`ll get us out of here."   
  
"After killing everyone in the base."   
  
"A minor technicality."   
  
"I`m not having anyone`s blood on our hands."   
  
"... You`re so weak it sickens me."   
  
"Better to be weak than a mass murderer."   
  
"Just give me control Jamie, do you **want** them to kill us? Do you **want** our father to wrack himself over what`s happening?"   
  
"... Give me... One promise..."   
  
"Long as I can keep it."   
  
"Don`t. Kill. Anyone."   
  
"I can`t keep that, I`ve already promised to kill them and the Wild Eagle **always** keeps his word."   
  
"... Please..."   
  
"Don`t get it do you?"   
  
"... Just take over. I hope I don`t regret this someday,"_ Jamie thought with a sniffle. The Wild Eagle was something that terrified him at so many levels, he envied it and yet he was disgusted by it. The ultimate in unavoidable love-hate relationships. "That`s what I thought," he said a few seconds later, though the voice wasn`t his own. His face and hair both seemed to change slightly, becoming streaked back towards either side like crests while his eyebrows lowered somewhat.   
  
The Wild Eagle had just been uncaged.   
  
Things were about to get _very_ ugly.   
  
  
Outside the cell, screaming and the sounds of sobbing could be heard after a loud thud, causing the lone gaurd to shift uneasily. The screaming continued, the sobbing picked up and the gaurd cringed inwardly, standing up and checking through the small sliding window in the door to see the youth laying on his side on the floor in the darkened cell. _"Damn,"_ he thought annoyedly. Something must have happened to the kid in-transit. Probably Del`s work, that guy always did have a habit of kicking the little guys too hard if they spoke up.   
  
Removing the keys from a chain on his belt, the gaurd calmly unlocked the door and opened it up, only to find that the teen had all but vanished from sight. "What the hell?"   
  
Stepping back but keeping his head peaked into the cell to make sure the kid wasn`t hiding under the excuse for a bed or anything.   
  
And that was when the heavy steel door slammed shut violently on his head with a rather disgusting series of cracks and squishing sounds. The gaurd fell to the floor a second later, dead, while the Wild Eagle quietly slipped out of the shadows behind the door and crouched down, grabbing the man`s gun and forcibly yanking the keys from the chain on his belt before pocketing them for himself.   
  
_ "... You killed him..."   
  
"Get over it."   
  
_ "And while your at it, learn to dress better," the Wild Eagle grumbled, stepping past the body and checking the gun. It was a pistol, plain, average power. It`d do.   
  
Turning down the corridor, the Wild Eagle paused at the sight before him: Over a dozen jail cells exactly like his own. _"Think we were the only prisoners?"_ He asked himself. _"... I hope not. If we were, then they killed anyone else..."_ Jamie answered. _"I`ll just check all the cells then. We may be able to use them as a distraction anyway,"_ the Wild Eagle thought, keeping the gun raised and stepping cautiously up to the first cell before opening the small window.   
  
"Who`re you?" The prisoner inside asked.   
  
"Let`s just say fate gave you an unlikely friend with a gun," the Wild Eagle replied, lowering his hand back into the pocket of Jamie`s shorts and removing the keys before unlocking the door and pushing it open. The prisoner stepped out slowly and took the keys. "Check the other cells and unlock any that have people in them," the Wild Eagle instructed, stepping forward slowly once again and checking down the hallway, vanishing into an open door a few moments afterward.   
  
A gunshot rang out, the former prisoner winced and glanced down the hall anxiously.   
  
Silence followed. Then footsteps.   
  
Then the Wild Eagle stepped back out of the room, holding a newly acquired gun and speaking up. "What`s your name?" He asked. "Terry," the prisoner stated slowly. "Well then Terry, ready to crash a parade?" The Wild Eagle asked, tossing the gun over to Terry, who caught it in one hand, using the other to unlock the door of the third cell.   
  
"Guess so..."   
  
"Then get ready, cause we`re about to do just that."   
  


_ End Chapter Two  
  
_

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**Author`s Note:** Sorry if my format seems hard to follow folks, it`s just the style I write in when I`m doing stories that aren`t first person-based. Hopefully you won`t mind too much that I intend to stick with it but... Either way. *shrugs.*  
  
Leave a review please, see ya!  
  
Sh33p out.  
  



	4. Promises kept, wills broken

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I don`t own Zoids.  
  


* * *

  
  


**New Age**  
Promises kept, wills broken   
  
  
  


"That`s the last of them," Terry reported lowly, creeping around the corner as the other four former-prisoners followed slowly behind, all of them frightened pretty badly at the moment. "Good," Jamie`s alter ego replied from one of the shadows. There were several seconds of audible struggle, a grunt and then a hard crack.   
  
A second later, an average sized figure toppled out of the shadows, a visible bulge in the middle of the neck, head tilted at a very _wrong_ angle. His gun was drawn a few seconds later and tossed over to Terry, who handed it off to one of the other prisoners. "Going to have to keep quiet... Good thing for us they didn`t get the best lighting for the prison part of their base," the Wild Eagle mused, glancing over his shoulder and down the hallway. "Come on," he ordered, waving his hand back to the rest of the group.   
  
Another minute passed before the lot found themselves standing in a better lit room, though it was still empty. The sounds of a bit of laughter could be heard coming through one of the other doors, and the Wild Eagle slowly crept towards it while the rest of the group stayed in place. Terry and the others seemed more intent on getting out alive than carrying out any promises of killing everyone.   
  
A second or two later, the Wild Eagle reared back and lashed out with his right foot, kicking the knob right off of the door and then swinging it open with an elbow. Five gunshots and a groaning yell rang out before he dove out of sight of the door. Terry rose his gun sharply, not even taking very effective aim before squeezing off a shot. Another groaning yell. Jamie`s body swing around again and three more shots echoed through the ears of the former prisoners.   
  
Seconds more passed, guns went flying through the air and the Wild Eagle stepped back into view, bearing not just a smug grin, but also a dangerous looking sub-machine gun. "From here on out we have three options," he stated. "Hide and wait, try to take them all out or escape. I don`t know about the lot of you but I`m going for number two," he explained grimly. Terry and the others exchanged worried glances and then looked back at the gun-toting youth before them with a mixture of fear an anxiety.   
  
"We just want to get out of here..."   
  
"I`ll buy you a distraction then. Do any of you remember the base lay-out?" The Wild Eagle asked. Only the lone woman of the group gave a nod. "Do you remember where the garage is then?" He asked. "Yes," she answered. "Good, I`m going to try and draw all of the attention and give you guys an escape route but it`s no gaurantee, you`ll mostly be on your own. Good luck," he explained before darting down another hallway, one he picked out on memory as being connected to the garage part of the base.   
  
_ "Are you sure we`re even in a base?"   
  
"Law of deductive reasoning Jamie, any gang good enough to have six or more people with the same uniform styling is a gang with at least a small base."   
  
"... You sound like some bad action movie character."   
  
"And you sound like a wimp, your point?"   
  
_ The Wild Eagle paused, holding his gun up and taking aim closely. The garage was one door away. The gang was either stupid or very basic to place the living quarters of it`s memories in as simplistic a lay-out as the one he`d seen so far, complete with leaving it near the prison part of the base.   
  
  
_ "That can`t be a good sign,"_ Marcus thought, watching the fading silhouette of a black-and-green Whale King moving up into the clouds. _"I thought this was a gang but it looks like I`m in over my head... Either that or this is one **big** gang,"_ he thought lowering his binoculars and shutting the cockpit of the Gustav again. He`d been smart to hide it in the shadows of a reasonably sized cave, the paint scheme he had picked out helped confirm that idea.   
  
"No time to wait for back-up though," he said to himself, flipping a switch to disengage the two trailers from his Gustav. No need for excess weight right now, not with what he was about to try. "Hopefully this isn`t suicide..."   
  
Pressing the accelerator once more, Mark drove the Gustav out of it`s hiding place and turned at something of an angle to the sprawling complex. It had to be close to a half a mile wide, at least, probably bigger to be able to hold a full sized Whale King on one landing strip. Mark refused to back down though, he was intent on seeing just what this was all about. Bringing the Gustav`s right gun to bear, Mark lightly began to press the trigger.   
  
  
The Wild Eagle paused atop the catwalk as a series of explosions rang through the hangar. Someone was attacking already.   
  
"Great timing," he commented as a stream of flashes streaked through the open hangar door and splashed across a dozen or more currently deactivated Gun Snipers. The hangar was filled with them, all had been modified with added sniper weaponry or rocket box-type munitions, the kind of stuff you`d see on military hardware. Dozens of base personnel were darting towards those Zoids that hadn`t been ripped apart by errant shots, and dozens more were darting towards those that had exploded in flames.   
  
Dropping his calm demeanor for now, as well as the sneaky aspect of what he was doing, the Wild Eagle stood up and raised his gun again, taking aim and starting to pick off pilots as the made for the cockpits of their Zoids during a slow walk towards the door on the opposite side of the catwalk.   
  
The catwalk shuddered and the Wild Eagle snapped around to watch a newly weakened, splitting support cable fracture further under it`s own weight. "Crap," he mumbled, instinctively grabbing the railing of the opposite side and anchoring himself in place, even as a few stray rounds bolted by and zinged off of the catwalk and the ceiling. Using his other hand, the Wild Eagle raised the gun again, somehow stably taking aim and squeezing the trigger. His would-be attack let out a scream and toppled over, clutching his side desperately.   
  
_ "Don`t!"   
  
_ "I made a promise and I`m going to keep it!" He affirmed to himself, squeezing off another shot and successfully taking a little off of the side of his target`s head. Along with a nice portion of his face. The catwalk shuddered again and the weakned cable snapped, followed by a second cable a few yards ahead, causing the entire thing to topple over almost sideways. If it had been Jamie, he`d`ve fallen down to a good many injuries.   
  
The Wild Eagle wasn`t Jamie. Same body, yes, but the same person? A resounding _**no**_ was the only answer to that question. One of the damaged Gun Snipers rested just ten feet below, a drop offset by the way the catwalk was still swinging. Jamie cringed from his vantage point, just waiting for things to end, but the Wild Eagle simply allowed himself to drop, somehow managing to balance on the opposite rail and fall back, only to reach up again and hold himself in place as if standing on a swing.   
  
_ "The other supports aren`t gonna hold long..."_ Jamie commented a bit nervously. "I know that, twit," the Wild Eagle replied, gingerly leaning back with his feet at an angle to support himself and keep from falling. Reaching down and locking his free hand tightly around the rail he was standing on, the Wild Eagle tilted himself forward and flipped down, swinging back with the catwalk itself, twisting to avoid more than a few bullets on the return swing before hurtling his body free of the catwalk entirely, allowing the section to tear loose entirely and collapse onto one of the open Gunsniper cockpits, shattering machinery and causing more than a few small explosions to rip through it before it toppled over forward and detonated.   
  
The Wild Eagle was only saved from being turned into the Fried Eagle by his own calculations. The swing had set him on the right course to crash into a number of apparently empty crates. Sure, he`d likely have a few splinters but it certainly beat being burned alive like a good many unfortunate base personnel.   
  
Leaning back up to stand, the Wild Eagle raised the gun again and pressed the trigger - hard. There was single shot and one of the pilots toppled over in a heap, followed by nothing but clicking.   
  
"Grand," the Wild Eagle grimaced, tossing the gun aside and darting towards a parked jeep, bullets zinging off of the steel plated flooring all the way.   
  
  
"For a group that obviously has the cash to finance a Whale King and a base of this size, these guys really suck," Marcus commented as he put another Gunsniper straight down. "Here I was expecting some gloriously epic, utterly one sided battle to the death..."   
  
Another Gunsniper detonated as Mark put a few dozen rounds straight into the cockpit and tagged the huge sensor disc on the back. "And all I get is a turkey shoot. Sheesh," he grumbled, swerving the Gustav around and going on a straight path. Several explosions clashed with the background noise as a few rounds lanced into the armor of the Gustav with minimal effect. "I mean... Really," he continued, idly swerving to avoid hitting a downed Zoid and inadvertently plowing straight into another Gunsniper, this one having been cloaked until the moment of impact.   
  
"Is a good fight _that_ freaking hard to come by?" He demanded, pausing the Gustav`s movements and hitting the reverse button, shoving the already downed Gunsniper under the Gustav and crushing it brutally before rolling away. The other Zoid detonated a few seconds later. "No friggin` wonder that Bit guy got into Class S, if all Zoid pilots suck _this_ bad then it`s easier than Hell," he quipped, pulling both triggers on the steering wheel and randomly giving several more Zoids a few drive-by-styled slugs through the legs. Another Gunsniper and no less than two Rev Raptors, followed by an unlucky Molga all went down in blazes, topped off by a Command Wolf struck squarely in the cockpit.   
  
"... Come on! Impress me! Give me something worth blowing up for cryin` out loud!" Mark yelled, more to himself than anyone else. It was like some crazy video game...   
  
And then an Iron Kong walked into view.   
  
"... Okay, I`m impressed..."   
  
The Kong rumbled and beat it`s fists against it`s chest.   
  
"... No really, that`s fine. I`m impressed... Really..."   
  
  
_ "If we die, I`m going to be **very** mad at you,"_ Jamie informed cynically. _"... Oh shut up you whiny twit,"_ the Wild Eagle replied, nonchalantly ducking his way under the fist of a pilot and reaching him. Both hands locked down across the man`s arm a second later, after that he was airborn, but the Wild Eagle was faster even than gravity it seemed, letting go with one of his arms and using it to wrap around the fellow`s neck in mid-air before twisting violently.   
  
One snap and a thud later, the Wild Eagle calmly stepped forward, gingerly beginning to climb a ladder to what looked like a modified Pteras, loaded down with enough armament to lambaste a small platoon. "You really need to learn to have more faith in me," he grumbled at himself. _"Well maybe if you weren`t insane, I would,"_ Jamie griped in reply.   
  
"... The mere fact that I exist dispels any arguement that I`m the only psycho here. You`re just more orderly about it," he replied to himself, swinging his admittedly light frame up into the cockpit and roughly kicking the co-pilot right out in the process. "And if we`re on the subject of pointing out each other`s flaws, you _really_ need to hit the gym sometime," he complained, pressing the activation key and allowing the cockpit to shut.   
  
_ "... But I don`t wanna..."   
  
_ "Damn it Jamie, I can`t properly hand out lots of ass and endure mach three suicide dives without at least having a tougher body... Besides, we`d look cooler," he replied to himself. _"... You are such a dolt..."_   
  
"A dolt? Probably. A pansy? No."   
  
That said, the Pteras` wings began to glow a dull shade of gold, while an unrestrained wind promptly echoed throughout the immediate area of the currently-grounded-but-not-for-long Pteras. Seconds passed as the Zoid eased up before coming to a stop, small arms fire raining in on the main body. _"Oh, please don`t..."_ Jamie begged. "Not my fault they won`t stop shooting," the Wild Eagle replied, reorienting the head of the Pteras to face downward.   
  
A few seconds of gattling fire later, the men had stopped shooting. They`d also, coincidentally enough, stopped breathing. "Sheesh, you`d think these idiots would get a better idea of what they`re up against here," the Wild eagle muttered. _"... Not their fault a fifteen year old schizophrenic ace pilot lunatic doesn`t exactly stand out in a crowd,"_ Jamie replied defensively. "... Good point, but still."   
  
All griping and arguing aside, the Pteras slowly tilted itself to a proper angle for flight, now at full power on hover as the Wild Eagle checked out it`s arsenal. "We`ve got four missiles, two heavy gattlings and a back-mounted mortar launcher. Any ideas?" He asked, accepting a rare consultation from his other side. _"Mortar the ceiling?"_ Jamie suggested. "But it`d be more stylish to blast straight out..." The Wild Eagle replied. _"Do both?"_ Jamie asked. "... There`s hope for you yet," the other sighed. "You do know that a lot of people are about to die, right?"   
  
_ "Don`t. Remind me."   
  
_ "Too late," the Wild Eagle said, pressing the mortart button with a smirk.   
  
  
"Well, that could`ve gone better," Mark mumbled to himself as the Gustav opened fire again. There was a fairly blatant, fist sized dent right in the side of it now, not to mention more than a few scorch marks lining it`s frame. The Kong pounded it`s chest again and charged forward, rocking wildly on it`s forearms while the shoulder mounted plasma cannon lowered into firing position. Mark glanced to his opposite side with disdain, spotting that he was sandwhiched between a moving bolder and a hard place, the hard place namely being the hangar`s wall. Behind him, a corner, in front of him, open space.   
  
It wasn`t a hard plan to come up with but it was really all he had.   
  
"Come and get me, beef cake!" Marcus shot off, suddenly pressing the accelerator once again and causing the Gustav to burst forward - about as fast as a Gustav could burst that is. The Iron Kong fell for it though, Marcus had caught the pilot in between strides at full speed and with all that weight, it wasn`t stopping any time soon.   
  
At least not easily. The Iron Kong smacked face first into the wall of the hangar, leaving a 75+ foot high, gorilla shaped dent in the wall, which promptly collapsed after the Zoid stumbled back out on it`s haunches. That was where the full effect of Mark`s plan came into play, and the Zoid trucker roughly slammed the breaks before shifting into reverse and accelerating an instant later, sending the Gustav`s surprisingly heavy bulk crashing right into the small, vulnerable rear legs of the Iron Kong, toppling the huge Zoid over and ripping the Gustav`s antenna right off.   
  
Marcus grimaced. "There goes some of the money I was going to use to get a new paintjob for the Fox," he growled. "**_BASTARD!_**" With that said, Marcus slammed on the accelerator again after shifting back into forward, smashing the Gustav into the de-legged Iron Kong and keelhauling it along on the ground, straight into a Command Wolf and after that, right into a stream of firepower from a modified Dark Horn, which itself promptly exploded in a manner eerily similar to most of the Zoids still inside the hangar.   
  
"What the...?" Mark asked, looking up to see a Pteras wildly corkscrewing in avoidance of a salvo of rockets. The Zoid seemed to have taken on a level of speed and manueverability it shouldn`t have had, slowing just before it could smack into the ground only to vertically dart right back up, causing the Gunsniper aiming for it to meet a brutal end as a Gojulas opened fire with it`s two heavy cannons.   
  
"I take it you`re here to help?" A voice asked over the comm. "... Uh... Yeah," Mark replied, swerving to avoid yet another downed Zoid. "Then cover the jeep that`s going to be leaving in five... Four... Three..."   
  
"I can finish a countdown on my own. What about you?" Mark asked, swerving up to a position of covering the jeep that had emerged exactly as the voice had said. "I`ll be fine... I just have some... Unfinished business to take care of here," it replied. "I`m Mark, by the way," Marcus offered. "Wild Eagle, Jamie`s alternate personality," the Wild Eagle exclaimed dryly as the Pteras streaked overhead, followed by a crashing Sinker.   
  
"... Well, that`s nice to know."   
  
"Just go, I`ll keep these guys off your back," the Wild Eagle ordered, the Pteras arcing up with alarming grace to turn around, launching all four of it`s missiles right into the secondary control tower of the base. The building crumpled like tin foil and toppled over in a burning wreck, crushing a dozen or more Zoids in the process.   
  
"... Okay, I take back what I said earlier," Marcus mused. "I guess being a Zoid pilot does take skill..."   
  
  
"Weird guy," the Wild Eagle commented. "Taking a Gustav up against a base like this?" He asked. _"Must have a death wish,"_ Jamie replied. "Wouldn`t surprise me."   
  
The Pteras gingerly circled the base once again before swerving upward, arcing gracefully into the air and then spraying down with it`s gattlings, coating the main control tower in bullets the size of the average man`s upper body. Under such an assault, the building didn`t last long, caving in and collapsing inward with everyone inside while the Wild Eagle corkscrewed again, bringing the Pteras up at the last second before opening the cockpit.   
  
"This is where we get off!" He shouted enthusiastically. _"... Don`t. Haven`t you killed enough for one day?"_ Jamie asked. "I don`t enjoy killing, but I made a promise and I intend to keep it!"   
  
With that, the Wild Eagle dove out of the cockpit, somehow managing to land softly and on his feet inside the moving back seat of a jeep, just as the Pteras slammed violently into the largest building of the facility, plowing through one wall after another until hitting the armory and detonating like one big bomb. With that said, he leaned up with a grin and backhanded the passenger before slamming his head straight into the dash and swiftly grabbing the gun from the driver.   
  
"Well what do we have here?" He asked, planting the gun into the side of the man who had the audacity to laugh at his earlier warning. Del only cringed and set the jeep to a stop, even as the base exploded in the distance in a firestorm visible from a mile away.   
  
"Don`t..."   
  
"But I promised. And didn`t I carry it out so far?"   
  
"Please..."   
  
"I told you I`d kill every last one of you. And now, I intend to finish it. Bye!"   
  
_ "**DON`T!!!**"_   
  
Two gunshots later, the Wild Eagle nonchalantly kicked both bodies out of the jeep and tossed the gun over his shoulder before swiping the driver`s seat.   
  
That was when Jamie took over again.   
  
"... You... Killed everyone," he muttered. It`d seemed so distant during the time when he was letting the Wild Eagle have control. It seemed like a bad dream, not real, like he was just watching a weird movie and all of the Wild Eagle`s victims were actually just knocked out. Like the base hadn`t been blown up.   
  
Jamie grimaced. _"I did."_   
  
"... Just shut up."   
  
The Wild Eagle complied without another word, leaving Jamie to sit in stark silence in contrast to the burning wreckage strewn about for almost a half a mile behind him.   
  
The sound of a teenaged youth crying wasn`t long to follow as the jeep sped off erratically.   
  


_ End Chapter Three  
  


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_

**Author`s Note:** Now you know why I came close to rating this one as 'R' :/  
  
If anyone thinks I should up the rating to R, just give the word. Don`t want to offend anyone severely here so...  
  
Anywho, hope you enjoyed this one, figured it was about time someone portrayed the Wild Eagle as something other than helpful. Leave a review and as always, _Sh33p_ out. See ya. 


	5. A Rookies Luck, Marcus vs Bit

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I don`t own Zoids.  
  


* * *

  
  


** New Age   
**A Rookie`s Luck - Marcus vs Bit   
  
  
  


It had almost been a week since Bit Cloud had thrown down the gauntlet and laid out the challenge to a Zoid Battle as soon as Mark finished registering and repairing the Shadow Fox. In that time, quite a bit had happened, not the least of which being Marcus having traded in the two trailers of his Gustav - along with that 'liberated' Gunsniper - and used the funds to buy a new trailer and finish the cost requirements to repair and modify the Fox. All in all, it hadn`t been too bad a week really.   
  
Marcus was a bit tired, settling himself down on the ground next to the trailer that he`d been keeping the Shadow Fox on. The Zoid still wasn`t exactly being friendly with him but it didn`t seem to be too hostile anymore. At least not openly. A campfire was burning a few feet away, and beside it was a plain, dark blue sleeping bag. "We got a big day ahead of us tomorrow," he said, more to the Shadow Fox than himself. The Zoid only seemed to grunt in annoyance. "But for now, I got a phonecall to make..."   
  
With that, Marcus calmly dialed up a certain number, namely the number for dorm room number A45C, the room number for one Abigail Summers, one of the three and a half thousand students who had chosen to take up residence on the massive facility known as the D Institute for Higher Learning, named after the ancient patron saint of Zoid research(they had to find _someone_ to commemorate as a saint for Zoid research given how widespread their usage was...). It was actually a combination of a Zoid, medical and archaelogical research facility, but that really didn`t matter to Marcus.   
  
He waited for several seconds with the phone pressed casually to his ear, resting on his back on top of the sleeping back, staring up at the twin moons of Zi. "Come on Abbie, pick up the phone," he mumbled to himself, glancing over at the Shadow Fox, which was practically sizing him up still.   
  
A few more rings and...   
  
"Hello?" A decidedly female voice asked over the roar of a party in the background. "Abbie?" Mark asked, having to speak up. "Yeah, I`m kinda locked up in my bedroom right now..." She stated, just loudly enough to get through the sound of the party outside. "Ah. Just calling to let you know that if I don`t call tomorrow, I love ya, `kay?" Mark asked.   
  
"... I love you too Markie, now get back here soon!" Abbie ordered sternly. "I will, just be sure to watch..." Mark thought a moment. "Channel seven tomorrow at work, alright?" He asked. "Alright," Abbie agreed after a thoughtful pause. At that, Mark decided to end the conversation, knowing she`d have a fit the moment she remembered what channel number seven was. "G`night Abbie, time for me to sleep."   
  
"Night Mark, love you!"   
  
"Lo-" The Shadow Fox interrupted with a well timed shriek. "-ve you!" Marcus said, quietly pressing the button to turn the phone off and then placing a well aimed glare at the Zoid. The Fox looked like it would have been grinning like some trickster god if it`s face could change expressions.   
  
"Just don`t pull something like that in the match tomorrow... I can probably bet money you don`t want a loss to the Liger placed on _your_ record, do you?" Marcus asked. The Shadow Fox let out another sound akin to a grunt and settled down on the trailer, not moving another inch as it`s eyes faded black.   
  
"Thought so," Mark grumbled before setting the phone down on the ground and slipping into the sleeping bag.   
  
  
The hangar bay of the Blitz Team base was mostly silent at present. The oversized garage was almost empty, bar the presence of a newly repaired Raynos and a Gunsniper that was also in the process of being repaired, though more due to heat and radiation damage than getting it`s limbs cut off or anything of that nature.   
  
Aside from that though, the hangar was almost entirely empty, occupied only by a jeep, a car and two additional figures which contrasted each other to an unbelievable degree. One was the hugely built Liger Zero, standing proudly as ever in the shadowed bay in it`s ivory-tinted base armor, accompanied by the hustling figure of a sleepless Bit Cloud, who was currently shuffling around in the hangar trying in vain to burn off excess energy and anxiousness.   
  
_ "Can`t lose,"_ Bit kept thinking, shuffling along on the smooth metal flooring like a boxer, even though he was too thinly built to do such a thing and even though he was wearing pajama pants and a sweatshirt. Bit was weird like that, nobody had really put any thought into his past prior to his time as a junk dealer, but he had been an amatuer boxer during High School, and he had graduated early to boot. He was nineteen now, he had spent three years doing little more than wandering the world as a junk dealer and he had spent little less than a twelfth as much time as a Zoid pilot, but that was all in the past.   
  
Bit wasn`t a boxer anymore, he hadn`t been since he graduated and stole his uncle`s garbage truck before fleeing the Wind Colony, but he still kept his skills intact, if only because it kept him in shape. Plus it was useful for burning off energy, like now.   
  
Usually, anyway.   
  
Tonight was just one of those nights though, Bit couldn`t sleep and he had personally finished repairing the Jaeger armor himself to try and wear himself out but all it did was breed more energy for him to have to burn off.   
  
A phantom punch here, a haymaker there. Liger seemed look on in vague amusement at it`s partner`s antics, though Bit could feel a bit of anxiety from the Zoid too. He had a connection to it, just one of those things that couldn`t be explained very easily. "Don`t give me that look," Bit grumbled, seeming to dance to the right of the Liger`s left forepaw. The Zoid rumbled lowly. "I don`t care if I look dumb, don`t give me that look," he chastised, backpedalling out in front of the Zoid and throwing around a dozen straight jabs ahead of himself.   
  
Liger growled something negatively.   
  
"Agreed. The pilot`s too much of a rookie to worry about, but the Fox still isn`t something to take - lightly," Bit said, pausing briefly with a grunt to throw an uppercut which in turn almost threw him off balance. Liger rumbled again. "Just tryin` to tire myself out so I don`t enter the battle as a zombie tomorrow," he replied to his Zoid`s concerned tone. "No need to worry - about - me!" He yelled, throwing another combination of moves that finished the job of knocking him off balance and in the process, knocking him over.   
  
"Okay, I think that`s enough o` that..."   
  
Zero rumbled once more.   
  
"... Oh shut up, least I can actually feel the floor," Bit retorted sharply.   
  
Zero rumbled once again.   
  
"... No you ninny, that doesn`t mean I can taste it."   
  
  
"Your move," Leyon stated with a half-concealed smirk after using the abilities of the piece he had just moved to take Steven`s favored Blade Liger out of the game from the fifth board. "... Sneaky," Steve commented. "But I`m sneakier," he added soundly, using the long range abilities of his remaining Gunsniper - which he had kept well hidden behind a fairly large rock - to pick off the Pterasniper that Leyon had just used on his favorite piece in the game. "... True, but I guess that just means I`ll have to resort to being the crazy bastard that I am," Leyon commented lazily, using the Megalomax option on one of his Dibison pieces to literally spam the area of the Gunsniper until nothing was left standing.   
  
"Not bad," Steve said with a pause. The game was called Five Tiered Zoid Battle Chess, usually referred to as 'Fitz Battling' because of it`s complex nature. Originally used as a light training tool in the old Guylos military for strategic officers, the game revolved around five 3D boards linked together by a plate-sized holographic projector, and over the years it had changed to include a card system and multiple moves per-turn, but the basis had always remained the same: Two or more people using a choice selection of up to fifty Zoids pick one another off until either one side is down to no units in the game, one side gives up or one side loses it`s home base.   
  
Despite it`s complex nature and the fact that few people could ever master it, the game was widely enjoyed, not the least of which by two well known former pros who happened to be playing right now, namely Leyon and Steve. "Think Bit`ll win tomorrow?" Leyon asked, more or less attempting to stir up a conversation about _something_ to throw Steve`s concentration off. Part of the game was that the terrain changed from game to game, one of the boards was under water, one was in the air and the home boards and the main fighting board were all on the ground, and you could only see things from the side of the game that you sat on, so if your opponent hid behind a rock or an abandoned building, you wouldn`t see them.   
  
"Probably. This 'Marcus Harlock' character seems to be a bit too green around the ears to do more than throw the Fox off," he answered after long pause, resorting to playing dirty and going to the Pteras he had up on the aerial board. "Seems that way. Only pilot that ever mastered it was Brad Hunter," Leyon replied, leaning back to glance over at the television.   
  
"Got you," Steven commented to himself, using the Pteras he had on the aerial board to execute a bombing run on Leyon`s base. "Not quite," Leyon replied just as Steve ended his turn, using a combination move of a Geno Breaker jetting up and slicing the Pteras in half with it`s head horn, landing on the border of his base and firing a long range Charged Particle Cannon assault straight at Steven`s base to even things back off.   
  
"... Damn," Steven grumbled.   
  
"Guess I`m winning, eh?" Leyon asked. "Not quite," Oscar cut in, just as the Geno Breaker and a significant chunk of both bases were removed from the game. "... You sneaky bastard," both men grumbled at their compatriot. "Take`s one to know one," Oscar said with an annoying grin.   
  
  
Game day.   
  
Marcus sat quietly in the cockpit of the Shadow Fox, arms crossed sternly over his chest. The Zoid was obviously anxious, but it didn`t do anything to try and make this known, it seemed a bit annoyed still but it wasn`t about to complain at the chance of a rematch with the Liger Zero.   
  
Speaking of which...   
  
"About time they showed up," Mark grumbled at the sight of the Hover Cargo off in the distance, followed by the sonic impact of the Judge capsule with the kind of force that could plow through most Zoids in an instant, throwing off a heat-and-dust shockwave from the high speed touchdown onto the ground. "Ready to kick some Liger ass, Fox?" Mark asked anxiously, setting his hands onto the controls of the Zoid and settling further into the seat. The Fox growled a little and waited, almost having to resist calling the Liger Zero out of the Hover Cargo personally.   
  
But Bit was a tad too intent on getting the match going to really keep the other fighter waiting. Without even coming to a stop, the Hover Cargo`s top launch bay slid open like a post office box and out came flying the blue speed demon itself, rocketing well over a hundred yards through the air before landing perfectly on it`s feet with a skid and a roar, all of fifty yards away from the Shadow Fox, which seemed to greet it like an old rival.   
  
"You ready?" A voice chimed in over the broadband. "As I`ll ever be," Mark replied, cracking his neck and shaking his shoulders briefly. "Good, cause so am I. Hope you know, Brad broke a table with his forehead because of you," Bit replied. "... Sorry?" Mark asked. "Tell him that after I beat you," Bit answered. "_If_ you beat me," Marcus replied.   
  
"Trust me, I will," Bit shot back. The smell of competition was practically thick enough to cut through with a knife and the fighting hadn`t even started yet. "All that`s left is for the judge to give off the rules and then..."   
  
"You`re mine," Marcus interrupted, finishing Bit`s sentence for him. "I wouldn`t be so sure of that," Bit argued with a near-audible grin.   
  
"**The area within a five mile radius is a designated Zoid Battlefield. This zone is now restricted. Only competitors and personnel have authorized entry. All others must leave the area at once...**"   
  
Tension filled the air as the Judge began to give off the rules to the Zoid warriors.   
  
"**Area scanned...**"   
  
_ "Let`s see how good you really are,"_ Marcus thought to himself, leaning forward.   
  
"**Battlefield set up...**"   
  
_ "Time to kick some tail, Liger,"_ Bit thought, recieving a guttural rumble from the Liger Zero in agreement.   
  
"**Bit Cloud of the Blitz Team versus Marcus Harlock, no affiliation. Battle Mode 0992. Ready... _FIGHT!_**"   
  
Both Zoids let out mirroring roars of challenge before the Liger Zero Jaeger burst forward, levelling off a near-sonic boom in the process. Marcus wasn`t ready - the Shadow Fox was, and it replied in kind by darting straight towards the oncoming Jaeger with reflexes honed through years worth of battle data input by it`s creator, Doctor Leyon, only now being put to use though.   
  
In the blink of an eye, the first passes had been made.   
  
The Shadow Fox tumbled through the air in a forward flip, carried aloft further by the sheering effect of the Jaeger`s full acceleration, while the Jaeger itself had to skid along to try and meet a decent stopping point a good two hundred yards away before swinging itself around on it`s foreclaws and letting loose with a hail of fire from it`s four head-mounted machine cannons. The Fox sprang out of the way, this time under Marcus` control, darting from side to side in a zig-zagging pattern for the Liger, avoiding more than it`s fair share of damage in the process before coming up to near point blank.   
  
"Pika-boo!" Marcus shouted loudly, bringing the Fox`s entire weight to bear and crashing the smaller Zoid headfirst into the chin of the Jaeger, throwing it back onto it`s haunches before the AZ 30mm Laser Vulcan Gun spun up, letting loose with a hail of high powered pulse lasers, which the Liger Zero dodged in an unorthodox fashion, boosting up off of the ground with it`s Ion Boosters, only to come spiralling back down in an agile twist and land awkwardly on it`s forepaws, swinging back around in a handspring-like movement before dodging to the side again in avoidance of the EMP Net Missile the Fox had launched in advance.   
  
"Better than I thought," Bit commented with mock annoyance. He was enjoying himself too much as it was, no real point in feeling anger over that fact. "Nice to know we don`t make a bad team," Marcus replied with a smirk, wheeling the Fox around with a hop and setting his eyes on the still position of the Liger Zero Jaeger, which was growling out threats at the Shadow Fox, a Zoid that seemed more amused than anything else by it`s compatriot`s emotional stance.   
  
"Thought this was gonna be easy, didn`t ya?" Mark asked.   
  
"Thanks for proving me wrong," Bit replied as the two Zoids made to charge each other again, only to break course and start running alongside one another, smacking together frequently.   
  
  
"So much for Bit winning this in the first few moves," Leena commented surprisedly. "... I`m screwed," Brad muttered sarcastically. Jamie was still as silent as he had been for the better chunk of the past week, staring more at his own hands than the battle that was being waged outside of the Hover Cargo. "Too bad Dad isn`t here, we could probably use his help for once," Leena mumbled to herself. "... How would he help? Cheer on the enemy team while playing with his toy Zoids?"   
  
"Exactly. Don`t _you_ think he`s got some sort of jinxing effect on anyone he cheers for?" Leena asked. "... For once, you have a point," Brad thought aloud, watching the battle with dreary interest.   
  
  
The two Zoids continued running for several seconds before the Shadow Fox came to a dead halt, leaving the Liger to charge forward and skid around to face it again as Marcus deployed one of his little surprises, dropping the Dual Shock Impact Cannon into view and pulling the trigger for it, almost at random. In a flash, the first significant shots of the battle had been made, and the Liger growled out in near anger as the smoke cleared afterward, revealing two fresh, sizable scorch marks centered around equally large dents in it`s right shoulder.   
  
"Don`t remember _that_ being in the Fox`s arsenal," Bit commented a bit annoyedly. "Who said I was gonna let my partner keep his options narrowed down to only three weapons?" Mark countered swiftly. "... Yanno, I think I like you already," Bit complimented. "About time I met someone else who was screwy enough to call their Zoid a partner like me and Leon do," he added. "That`s nice. I`m just doing this for my girlfriend`s college funds," Mark replied with a shrug. "Cool," Bit said with an equally mundane tone of voice before casually pressing the trigger again.   
  
The Fox shuddered as a pair of rounds smacked into it, impacting just behind the cockpit and nailing it in the base of the neck. "Low blow," Marcus grumbled. "Nyeh nyeh," Bit shot back before the Jaeger burst forward again, only to find that the Fox had expected it a move in advance and jumped up, this time leaving it`s foreclaws oriented downward and twisting around.   
  
In a flashing thud, the Jaeger spun out of control, the Shadow Fox firmly locked onto it`s back with claws sinking down into the joints of the Jaeger boosters, causing the other Zoid to roar in fury before tumbling over sideways and throwing the Shadow Fox off.   
  
Marcus grunted and wiped the small trickle of red from his forehead as the momentum flung him around hard enough that the safety harness failed for all of a second and allowed his head to smack into the metallic part of the seat. The rookie pilot didn`t complain though, he actually didn`t seem to notice it either but that wasn`t the point.   
  
Again, the tow Zoids rose, and again they clashed, with the Jaeger charged forward and catching the Shadow Fox off gaurd before clawing at it relentlessly, leaving several visible scrapes running across the belly of the Fox before it had ever even hit the ground, even while Mark retracted the Double Impact Cannon, allowing the Fox to backflip out of the assault on it`s own and catch the Liger squarely in the chin with it`s hind legs, landing a bit awkwardly in a handspring-like stance before righting itself and letting loose with a stream of pulse lasers.   
  
The Liger twisted out of the way again though, even though it`s right stabilizing fin took a hit and gained a brand new hole running straight through it, catching itself and landing on all fours after another second only to jump sideways as the Fox trailed it with further pulse laser attacks.   
  
The Jaeger paused, the Fox lunged forward, ending it`s laser assault with a synthesized shrieking howl in mid-air. Both Zoids collided brutally as Bit brought the Liger into a rapid twist while already on the ground, catching the Fox in the stomach while the Fox raked it`s claws across the Liger`s side and stomach, throwing both Zoids apart from each other with a thunderous roar from both sides, sending the Fox crashing straight into the ground while the Liger rolled along and came back up, shaking the dirt and dust off of itself and turning to face the Shadow Fox once more.   
  
"Strike Laser Claw!" Bit shouted, spiking the power to the claws and the boosters while rotating them at the same time, bringing the Jaeger into a sideways jump at the Fox, flying into a corkscrew for it`s strike. Mark seemed to read the move though, bringing the Shadow Fox into a decidedly un-rookie-like move by jumping it straight up and corkscrewing into a sideways flip, allowing the Jaeger to pass straight through where the Fox had been standing mere seconds before.   
  
"Strike Laser Claw!" Marcus shouted as the Fox began to descend, bringing both claws into a combined stab at where the Liger had landed, missing by mere inches but still taking the very tip of the other Zoid`s tail off in the process. The Jaeger had already moved though, the blowback from it`s acceleration almost sent the Shadow fox back a few yards but the smaller Zoid held it`s ground, literally until it managed to tear it`s foreclaws clear again.   
  
"Give up yet?!" Mark demanded, bringing the Fox into a run straight through the Liger Zero`s exhaust trail, opening up with the Fox`s own concealed thrusters to speed up until the two Zoids were seperated by only a few dozen yards. "Not a chance!" Bit yelled back, swinging the Jaeger Boosters` aim downward and throwing the Liger Zero up and off of the ground in an increased jump that left the Fox to run straight under.   
  
If not for the Shadow Fox`s own skills and reflexes, the oncoming hail of machine gun rounds would have likely rained on Mark`s parade, but in a show of agility that most would`ve puked at, the Zoid brought itself into an acrobatic jump out of the way, spinning and flipping through the air several times before coming to a stop, the AZ 30 raising up out of fixed-forward firing mode and tilting to aim at the neck of the Jaeger, which just barely managed to drop down in time to avoid it, earning a perfectly placed burn mark along it`s nose for it`s efforts.   
  
  
"This is actually closer than I thought it would be," Oscar admitted with both brows raised. "Here I was thinking Bit would win in the first few moves and this rookie`s keeping him in the game," he added. "Give it five minutes, by then, Bit`ll have finished playing around with him," the Doc commented dryly. "Your move," he said with an exhausted grin. "... Gnagh..." Leyon sounded, somehow finding the mental strength to think up a plan for his next move. He quickly used one of his Iron Kongs and trampled through the ankle of Steven`s Death Saurer, taking several points off of it in the process. Steven was nonchalant in following his opponent`s move up by having his remaining Storm Sworder kamikaze the Iron Kong right out of the game.   
  
"Maybe he`s like Brad," Leyon commented. "Eh?" Steve asked, watching with a twitch when Leyon used his Geno Saurer to blow off the Death Saurer`s head from across the board. "Able to survive the Fox long enough to pilot it effectively... Doubt he`s the pilot I wanted though," Leyon answered. "And who did you want?" Oscar asked. "Someone who wouldn`t just own it," Leyon answered cryptically. "That`s the only way you can bring out the potential of any Zoid, you can`t just command the damn thing and expect it to do everything because you tell it too," Leyon explained. "Yep," Steven answered back, using a trio of Cannon Tortoises to try and tag the Geno Saurer at range.   
  
"Wonder if Brad`ll ever unlock the Key System?" Leyon asked. "Key System?" Steven asked. "Eh... Nothing," Leyon answered. "Right. Oh look, **_DIE GENO SAURER, DIE!!!_**" Steve cackled as prolonged bombardment by his Cannon Tortoises seemingly won the day. "Nope," Leyon replied, simply replacing the Geno Saurer with a Geno Breaker.   
  
"... This is gonna be one of those games," Steve grumbled.   
  
  
Again and again the Fox and the Liger clashed across the flat terrain of the battlefield, waging a battle that refused to die down in the least with increasingly shorter, increasingly rare times of rest between each flurrying offensive either side pressed on each other.   
  
This time around, the Fox seemed to come out on the losing end of the Liger smacked it hard across the cheek-region of the head with an open pawed strike in mid-air, aided by the speed of the Jaeger Boosters as if performing an uppercut. The Shadow Fox tumbled back through the air above the battlefield, landing roughly on all fours before dodging to the side in a near-blur, avoiding the crashing onslaught of the Jaeger`s foreclaws, even though the larger Zoid used this brief time to tilt it`s thrusters to the side and spin itself around, rooted by it`s claws, before sending off a hail of machine gun rounds.   
  
Fox growled and faltered back under the assault.   
  
"Right, we`ll need some cover to catch our breath and if we can`t find any," Marcus replied, flipping the switch on the newly enhanced Smoke Projectors. "We`ll just have to make our own!" He shouted, just as the Fox vanished in an artificial cloud of smoke so heavy that it refused to dissipate even as a strong gust of wind whipped through the battlefield.   
  
_ "Not bad,"_ Bit mused.   
  
"He`s using the Projector system, try and charge around it and whip it into a tornado, then it`ll blow itself out!" Brad shouted over the team-only channel, experience doing the planning ahead of his words. "Alright," Bit agreed, taking a moment to allow the Liger to rest up and then accelerating forward, straight around the ground-level cloud of smoke, curving into a circle pattern a few seconds later.   
  
Faster and faster the Jaeger went, until after several seconds, the smoke began to curl in on itself and then expand, in an exactly circular tornado as Brad had predicted.   
  
What happened next, however, wasn`t something Brad had predicted.   
  
"**_STRIKE LASER CLAW!_**"   
  
Bit yelped in surprise as the Fox emerged out of the cloud, above and in front of the Jaeger, coming down at an angle and aiming straight for one of the Jaeger`s boosters. As fast as was humanly possible, Bit tried to veer out of the way but the effect of his own tornado came back to haunt him and in an unbelievably badly timed sort of way, delaying his turn by almost a full quarter of a second.   
  
It was all the Mark and the Shadow Fox needed to get their hit in, cleaving straight through the parts connecting the right Jaeger Ion Booster to the Liger Zero itself and sending the piece flying through the air, where it too was gripped by the winds and dragged back around, slamming into it`s counterpart with ferocious speed as the Fox unsteadily touched down and rocked back ever so slightly under the pacing of the winds, which died down almost immediately after the Liger tumbled out of control, now bearing a simply missing Booster to one side and fairly charcoal colored burn mark across the other.   
  
"Rookie`s luck," Marcus commented with a prideful little smirk. The Shadow Fox growled something of an affirmative and turned around slowly, facing it`s former partner and waiting.   
  
Seconds passed and the Liger Zero Jaeger unsteadily brought itself back up, turning around to face the Shadow Fox and shaking itself out. "Not bad at all," Bit commented with an uneasy breath over the broadband communications set-up. "Same to you," Mark replied with an even tone, wiping the sweat and blood from his forehead and waiting.   
  
"Well?" Bit asked.   
  
"Well what?"   
  
"We gonna finish this or are we gonna stand around and wait?"   
  
"And your proposal is?"   
  
"Strike Laser Claw each other. Same time, whoever wins that, wins the match," Bit proposed cautiously. "It`s on," Marcus replied as the Shadow Fox lowered itself slightly.   
  
"Strike!" Bit shouted out, just as the Liger began to rush forward again, trailing behind whisps of black smoke as the golden glow began to appear on it`s foreclaws.   
  
"Laser!" Marcus added, just as the Fox`s own claws began to glow in the same color as those of the Liger Zero, even as it too charged towards the larger Zoid. Both pilots were obviously either insane or hyped up on adrenaline, otherwise they would have tried to just shoot each other at a distance.   
  
"**_CLAW!!!_**"   
  
  
"... Lunatics," Leena muttered in disbelief. "Oh, you _would_ be one to talk," Brad commented sourly. "Can it," Leena growled villainously. "I didn`t say anything, it was Jamie," Brad coolly lied, motioning with his thumb at the still-moping teenager at the driver`s seat. "... Is that so?" Leena asked with a twitch. "Oh, totally... Did I mention he gave away the location of your cookie stash to Bit?"   
  
"... **_WHAT?!_**"   
  
"Sell-out," Jamie grumbled annoyedly in Brad`s direction, promptly diving behind the console and rolling out of sight.   
  
  
With a blinding flash, it was all over.   
  
On any day before today, the Liger Zero Jaeger would have won, narrowly in any event, but it would have won. The original Strike Laser Claws of the Shadow Fox were a good 10% weaker than those of it`s larger opponent, but as of today, that imbalance had been corrected.   
  
As of today, the two were deadlocked in at least that respect. As such, the results were equally deadlocked when both Zoids were blown apart from each other and sent to wildly fling through the air and slam into the ground with mirroring rolles before stopping, leaving the Shadow Fox`s combat system at less than 5% and the Liger`s at an equally poor level of performance. Both Zoids had been hurt and both were all but exhausted in every respect as a result.   
  
A few more seconds.   
  
And then...   
  
"Good fight," Bit commented as the Liger froze up. Damage from the entirety of the battle had finally done his partner in for the time being, putting the Liger down and disabling it from making any attacks as a result.   
  
"You too," Mark replied, facing the same conditions as the Shadow Fox shrieked out something akin to a bruised drunkard`s cry of victory and collapsed, combat _and_ command systems both frozen. It hadn`t taken as much damage as the Liger had, but by that same token, the Fox wasn`t as durable.   
  
"Guess this means a draw then, huh?" Mark asked towards the Judge, waiting for an answer.   
  
It wasn`t long in coming.   
  
"**Battle over! Battle over! This match has been determined a draw!**" The Judge announced, as expected, before launching off of the battlefield and back towards whichever Judge Satellite happened to be in easy range. Both combatants sighed heavily as their Zoid cockpits opened up, allowing a ragged looking Marcus to tumble out and take in a few heavy breaths before sitting up and glancing down the fifty or so feet to the equally exhausted looking Bit Cloud.   
  
"What now?!" Mark asked tiredly, hauling himself up and leaning against the Shadow Fox, still bleeding slightly from the cut across his forehead. "Heck if I know!" Bit yelled back, throwing his jacket off and flopping against the burnt nose of the Liger with a wheeze. Even if they hadn`t been trading punches, the toll was the same on both men - they were tired. Mentally and physically, it had been a draining battle and it had left them both all but exhausted as a result.   
  
A few minutes went by as the two waited for the Hover Cargo - which seemed to be moving a little erratically for a little while - pulled itself up between them, followed by the forward garage opening up for the Liger.   
  
Inside, Brad was standing with a cryptic look on his face, staring past Marcus and straight at the Shadow Fox.   
  
"Well?!" Marcus yelled out at the former mercenary.   
  
Brad paused for a few seconds, thoughtfully regarding his decisions and then shrugging. "It`s your`s! Just run it daily and keep it well off or else!" Brad shouted back before turning and walking over to Bit, ready to help load the downed Liger Zero up and head back to the base.   
  
"... Well, that was unexpected," Mark said to himself before faltering down and sitting against the Shadow Fox. "I need a few minutes to rest before I bring the Gustav in to pick you up... Gimme a minute," he told the Zoid, certain it likely wouldn`t hear him either way.   
  
  
"Not bad," Harabec admitted with barely contained amusement at his nephew`s mere survival of a bout with the burgeoning legend that was Bit Cloud. "Coulda done better, but... That`s just me," he added with a mumble. Abbie was twitching every few seconds at the mere sight of what had just gone down, and most of the patrons in the resturaunt were either cheering or too surprised to say anything.   
  
"... Beck, you mind if I kill your nephew?" Abbie asked, not really sure if she was joking or telling the truth. "Ah, don`t mind him too much Abbie, it`s in his blood after all," Harabec replied with a shrug, gingerly taking a sip of his water with his elbow propped up on the countertop. The green haired young woman on the other side of things simply shook her head and sighed.   
  
"What am I going to do with him?" She asked. "Probably marry him," Harabec commented with a knowing smirk. "Aside from that," Abbie replied. "Smack him a few times with a frying pan no doubt," Harabec answered.   
  
"Have you seen this kid?" A new voice, along with it`s owner, cut into the conversation rudely. Harabec blinked a few times at the picture that had been so rudely jammed into his face and then politely pushed it away. "That`s Vega Obscura, who hasn`t?" He asked sarcastically. "Has he been in here recently?" The youthful voice asked impatiently. "A week ago, he was here with his friends celebrating the Blitz Team`s arrival into Class S, why?" Harabec asked.   
  
"Because," the other replied, nonchalantly walking to the door before turning over his shoulder. Given that he wore a jacket with a hood on that obscured the greater part of his face from the mouth up, Harabec had to strain somewhat to see even the slightest part of his face as he spoke up.   
  
"I`m going to kill him."   
  
The doors shut too swiftly for Harabec to do anything but started to climb over the counter and by the time he had gotten outside, the young man had vanished already.   
  


_ End Chapter Four  
  


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_

**Author`s Note:** The real plot starts forming in the next few chapters... Was just usin` the past few to help establish the characters and all - and don`t worry, Brad and Leena will both start taking far larger roles than they have so far in the next few chapters, which will also probably introduce a few more characters.  
  
Anywho, Sh33p out, leave a review and see ya next time!  
  



	6. The Mysterious Benefactor

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I don`t own Zoids.  
  


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** New Age  
** The Mysterious Benefactor   
  
  
  


"I can`t help it if Brad _wanted_ the guy to have his Zoid," Bit complained over the roar of Leena`s annoyed voice. "So?!" Leena demanded. "Get off his back Leena, I`m the one who made the choice," Brad interrupted, cool as ever despite being met the intense glare of Miss Death herself. "Why? You _know_ Dad is gonna have a fit!" She yelled into his face at point blank. Brad was unphased. "You apparently didn`t see the way it reacted to him, huh?" Brad asked, casually keeping his hands in his pockets as the group exited the jeep. They had come to town for a few reasons today, the primary being that they were going to visit Doctor Leyon in the hospital, the secondary being that Bit wanted to go to the arcade, Leena was on a slight shopping binge and Brad had arranged to have lunch with Naomi and Leon.   
  
"We`re here," Bit announced like a parent speaking to children who deserved to be scolded for bad behavior, hopping out and taking the keys with him. "I`ll be in the arcade - like always," he announced, speed walking towards the entrance from the parking lot. "I`ll be everywhere," Leena replied with a grin, jogging off toward the entrance, roughly knocking Bit out of the way in the process.   
  
"Lunatics," Brad commented dryly, stepping forward and stretching his arms out after removing his hands from his pockets. A few seconds later, he was moving again, walking at a ginger pace towards the entrance of the mall. "Absolute lunatics," he said again. Brad never even had time to notice the bolt of green coming up behind him at a few hundred miles per hour.   
  
  
"You wanted to see me?" Altiel asked dryly. The Gaurdian Force`s Joint Government Super Maximum Security Prison wasn`t exactly the choicest location for a meeting, let alone a meeting with Major Palta, one of the few members of the newly defunct Backdraft Group who had been parolled since they were unable to find enough on him to keep him locked away like so many others. "Yes sir," Palta replied. He was one of those lucky few who had also dropped a good many of his old habits, including the use of those odd sunglasses that doubled to hide the scars across his face.   
  
"About?" Altiel asked. It had been enough of a chore to bribe the gaurds into dropping charges without having to dip into his shrinking budget. Thankfully, despite all of her intellect, Sarah was never the brightest type of person about certain... Pictures. Altiel had the sense to keep a few as personal momentos. His gaurds happened to be a little perverted and... Well, you do the math. After that there had been the task of the cameras but Palta had taken care of things at that end, bribing the gaurds who checked for contraband, drugs, weaponry and other such things and bringing along a scrambler to finish things up. The conversation most certainly _was not_ being recorded.   
  
"A series of... Incidents that have been happening lately," Palta answered. "'Incidents?'" Altiel asked. "You`ve come all the way out here to tell me about a bunch of 'incidents?'" He growled. "It`s more important than you think, _Altiel_," Palta exclaimed, sternly reminding Altiel that the former Backdraft chief ranking operative beneath the Committee of Seven no longer commanded him anymore.   
  
"How so?" Altiel demanded. "Someone has been picking off former Backdraft members in the chain of command, one by one. They got Iyoga, Koga and Neguro a few days ago, Ciere`s home was turned into a smoldering crater last night. All of them had their Zoids, it`s believed that Neguro was even piloting his Geno Saurer," Palta explained. "... What do you mean by 'picking off?' Do you mean they`ve been defeated and hospitalized or..."   
  
"Yes. They`re all dead, along with a dozen other former high ranking members of the Backdraft. Details are still extremely sketchy in each case though, the only clues are coming from the fact that whoever`s doing it is going by a near random pattern, up and down. The last member that got picked off was a failed former member of the King Project, someone who ranked extremely low on the rung."   
  
"And that means?"   
  
"That means that either you or Sarah is going to be next. The only reason the Comittee of Seven haven`t been killed yet is probably because nobody can identify them," Palta surmised. "... Absurd," Altiel said with a shrug. "What do you mean?" Palta asked. "Look around this prison, Palta. Every corner is gaurded by an Iron Kong, every straight wall by a Shield Liger and every sentry tower by a Gunsniper! Every hour, three Pteras and three Redlers fly overhead and you honestly think someone, no matter _how skilled_ they are is going to be able to get to _me_? Attacking this place is as insane as trying to get out!" Altiel glowered. "You`re making a mistake, Altiel," Palta warned.   
  
"Let that lunatic try and get me, then let him meet his own demise trying to do it. This was a waste of my time Palta, get the hell out and don`t come back unless you have something worth contributing," Altiel growled, standing up straight and walking to the door before smashing on it twice with a fist. "Gaurd! We`re done!"   
  
"... You`re making a bigger mistake than you think Altiel, I hope for your sake it doesn`t come back to haunt you," Palta replied, standing up and heading for the door himself.   
  
  
"It`s been an hour," Leon commented annoyedly. "He should have shown up by now unless something happened," Naomi replied, a rare tinge of worry making it`s way to the surface, underlining the concern she hid. "Should we go look for him?" Leon asked. "I don`t know," Naomi stated uncertainly. "It isn`t like Brad to be late - ever. He`s almost like clockwork, something had to have happened," Leon mused. "How would you know?" Naomi asked sarcastically. "I worked with him on the Blitz Team for a year, Naomi. Really," Leon replied with the same time.   
  
"Wanna look around then?" Naomi asked, finally standing up and patting the back of her trench coat. "Yeah. Bit was coming with him, so was Leena, so our first choice should be the arcade," Leon deduced. "How do you come by that?" Naomi asked with a smirk. "This is Bit we`re talking about, name a place in a mall you`re likely to find him in other than an arcade or the food court," Leon replied with a similar expression. "Lead the way then, Sherlock," Naomi ordered.   
  
"Aw, but I was going to be the gentleman, dear Watson," Leon replied, even as he began walking ahead of Naomi. "The day a Tauros is anything remotely akin to a gentleman is the day I wear a nun`s uniform and fly around Nyx chanting the joys of celibate cabbage picking," Naomi chided while walking after him.   
  
  
"And another one bites the dust," Bit stated gingerly as he brought down a fifth challenger in the game. He had spent the past hour on an undefeated streak in the 3D Zoid Battles game that he had taken a liking to a few weeks prior to the Royal Cup. "Next!?" Bit asked with a cheesy grin plastered all over his face, waiting for another unwitting piece of cannon fodder to join in the unending battle.   
  
"Hey Bit," a new voice said as the side of the simulator opened up to reveal Leon and Naomi standing beside it. "Still picking on non-warriors?" Naomi chided. "... Bah, it`s all the same to me dangit. If someone has the guts to step up to the Royal Cup champion, not _my_ fault they don`t know what they`re messing with," Bit stated, exiting the game and allowing himself to be pried out by Naomi and Leon.   
  
"Somethin` I can do for ya?" He asked, idly tucking his hands into the unzipped pockets of his jacket. "Any idea where Brad is?" Naomi asked. "Oh I see," Bit replied slyly only to silence at the quasi-death glare he earned as a reply. "He didn`t show up," Leon informed. "Oh... That`s odd, Brad`s like clockwork most of the time... Come to think of it, he`s only been late once or twice in the entire time I`ve known him," Bit commented surprisedly. "Told you," Leon said at Naomi. "Maybe you did, maybe you just saw a double eclipse, we`ll never know," Naomi replied with a lazy shrug.   
  
"I don`t even wanna know... Something wrong about Brad though?" Bit asked. "We`re just worried, thought he might be with you," Naomi stated. "Ah... Well, he isn`t with me and unless he was serious about the pink knackers I doubt he`s with Leena," Bit replied. "Pink knackers?" Leon asked, an eyebrow quirked up into the middle of his forehead. "Long story. I`ll let him explain," Bit said with a shrug.   
  
"Wanna go look for him with us?" Naomi offered. "Don`t see any harm in that... Besides, I can harrass him while he`s explaining the pink knackers to you that way," Bit replied with one of those grins that screamed '**SMACK ME!**'   
  
The trio left the arcade soon after.   
  
  
It was dark. That was all he could think of when he came to, glance languidly from right to left and then center again. _"What in the name of Zi hit me?"_ Brad asked, rubbing what felt like an inch wide lump on the back of his head, underneath the mess of shoulder length hair he kept well grown and cared for. It wasn`t cold, but it wasn`t exactly warm either, Brad guessed the temperature to be around 70*, maybe 71* tops.   
  
When he tried to move, that was when he noticed something else. Brad realized that even though it was dark, his confines weren`t _just_ cramped, they were cramped in a specifically familiar pattern that almost unnerved him. _"If this is the same then..."_   
  
Going off of sheer memory and suspicion, not to mention the fact that he was also held in place by something that also held a unique familiarity, Brad reached out and pressed what seemed like a touchscreen.   
  
Exactly as he had believed, the entire area wasn`t a prison of confinement. For better or worse depending on one`s point of view, Brad Hunter found himself seated in a cockpit that had been built in the exact model of the cockpit design used on the Shadow Fox, altered only in the respect that it`s third trigger was missing and a new button had replaced the manual trigger mechanism used for the Strike Laser Claw.   
  
"What the hell is this?" Brad asked himself as the cockpit finished flaring to life, internal lighting fading away as the view screen mechanisms kicked in. The first thing that caught Brad`s eye was the scenery, the second were the two lone figures who accompanied it. One was a strikingly green, inhuman looking creature, standing a foot or two behind a man who was about Brad`s own size and stature with short, dark, slick black hair and pale, almost deathly looking skin.   
The most noticable thing about him though, where his eyes. Hauntingly malevolent and as green as an emerald, the same color as the creature which stood behind him. Brad stared for several seconds, unblinking, watching as the man smiled and then seemed to vanish, enveloped by the creature. That was when he got a good look at it, good enough to tell that it wasn`t some dog, it was a metallic dragon of some kind, the same size as a man.   
  
The creature shrieked towards Brad`s location and then vanished in a streak of neon green towards the sky, disappearing off into a cloud with the echoing call of a whale king not far behind.   
  
"... What in the hell just happened?" Brad asked himself, checking over the cockpit and then pressing a button he had familiarized himself with: Diagnostics. "A... What in the heck is a Scout Fox?" Brad asked, staring at the small monitor with curiosity lacing his eyes.   
  
That of course, was not a very good thing.   
  
When Brad Hunter was curious, chaos wasn`t very far off.   
  
  
Bit paused as a ringing sound echoed out of one of his pockets. Naomi and Leon both stopped a second or so later and turned to face him, both with a bit of annoyance evident in their eyes. Bit just sheepishly shrugged and removed his cell phone, opening it up and speaking a moment after. "Hello?" He asked. "Brad? Where are you?" Bit asked, watching the annoyance fade off of Leon and Naomi`s faces. "You don`t know where? Scout Fox? Hold on Brad, slow down a bit..."   
  
"Something wrong?" Naomi asked, beating Leon to the punch by a split second. "Hold on a sec Brad," Bit ordered, taking the phone down and putting his hand over the mouthpiece. "Brad somehow wound up in something called a Scout Fox, he doesn`t know how and he doesn`t know where he is," Bit explained before putting the phone back up to his ear. "Still there?" He asked.   
  
"Alright, if it`s that similar to the Shadow Fox, just try and access a map like you could with your old Zoid," Bit suggested, waiting several seconds before facefaulting. "Three miles from the base?!"   
  
"Come on Leon," Naomi ordered, turning around and heading for the first exit she could find. "Which also means 'come on Bit,'" Leon said aloud, grabbing the Royal Cup champion and effectively dragging him along. "Taking the Gustav?" Leon asked. "Unless you want Bit giving you a lapdance in the Blade Liger cockpit, yes," Naomi replied, hiding a harsh little smile at the mortified looks on both Bit and Leon`s faces.   
  
"Alright. See ya there Bit," Brad said. "See ya," Bit replied, just as the small static screen popped out of view on the main monitor, leaving Brad alone again. "Well... Since I`ve got three miles and no one to try and stop me, may as well see just exactly what you can do," Brad said aloud, working the controls in the proper fashion to put his new Zoid at top speed.   
  
As a result, Brad was all but thrown back into the seat. "So much for thinking your speed was less than the Shadow Fox," he thought aloud, forcing himself forward and slowing the Scout Fox back down to a tolerable speed, which allowed all of the blood to rush back into the front portion of his body in a dizzying effect that left him feeling a bit green for several seconds. "Alright... And let`s see what kind of gun you have," Brad said to himself, moving around the topside gun and then pressing the trigger, sending off a stream of pulse-styled bolts of plasma into the sky above, though none of the shots survived to hit a cloud or anything like that.   
  
Glancing down, Brad checked the diagnostics again, reasoning that it would be better for him to know his Zoid`s weaponry without firing everything off.   
  
The lazy smirk that formed on his face said everything else without any words being needed to do so.   
  
"Yeah, this`ll do _quite_ nicely," Brad said to himself, though it caused the Scout Fox to let out a light shrieking sound in reply.   
  
  
"Well, where is he?" Leon asked as the Gustav ground to a steady halt on the cemented ground in front of the Blitz Team base. "He said he`d be here..." Bit answered with a tinge of uncertainty, leaned forward with his elbows on the back of either seat. "Could be inside, let`s go," Naomi ordered as the cockpit flipped open to allow the three inside to exit. Naomi went first, she had been moving quicker than either Bit or Leon since she and the other Red Comet had left the food court at the mall. Leon hopped out after her but Bit sort of froze in mid-air and fell flat on his face the moment he tried to get out.   
  
With good reason mind you, wasn`t every day that a Zoid sort of... Materialized in front of you in mid-air.   
  
"Well, that was worth the wait," Brad said as the cockpit of the Scout Fox slid open with a gasping sound, the head lowering down to ground level for Brad to hop out, still wearing that smug grin on his face. "Cloaking device?" Leon asked dryly. "Yep," Brad answered in the same tone. "Figured as much," Leon replied with a casual shrug. Naomi only gave Brad a sarcastic, expectant look while Bit pried himself off of the ground and dusted himself off, trying in vein to keep his composure.   
  
"Oh and Bit, I think you forgot something," Brad reminded, tucking his hands into his pockets. "Huh?" Bit asked. Brad cleared his throat. "What?" Bit asked again. "About this tall, weighs about twenty pounds less than Naomi, pinkish-red hair, weird sticks somehow defying gravity and hanging onto a hairpiece on the back of her head..." Brad trailed off. Bit just quirked up an eyebrow. "Eh?" He asked. "Mild sociopath..."   
  
"Oh crap, I forgot to leave the keys with Leena!"   
  
  
"When I get my hands on those two..." Leena began, coolly sitting in the passenger`s seat of the jeep with about 30 bags somehow crammed into the back.   
  
  
Altiel grunted to himself. Bad enough he was stuck in solitary, the design of the cell meant that whenever he had to use the toilet, he was stuck staring out of the window at the mountain on the horizon, more than two miles away. On most nights, that meant he`d be able to see next to nothing.   
  
On this night though, something caught his eye as he hauled his considerable weight off of the toilet, wiped himself up and flushed it, pulling his pants up a second later. Something out there on the top of the mountain, just faintly visible on the top of the mountain, between the two moons of Zi. It was mostly black though, something that compromised Altiel`s ability to see it`s outline.   
  
And that`s when he noticed a small-but-intense glow coming from the center of the object. It was mostly white, but also streaked with a myriad collection of other colors outlining it, sort of like...   
  
A Charged Particle Cannon.   
  
"Oh god..."   
  


_ End Chapter Five  
  
_

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**Author`s Note:** This`ll be the last chappie for a little while... Gonna start postin` more the moment I complete five of them :P  
  
As for the reviewers:  
  
Forte - Nah, Marcus isn`t much of a self-insert avatar wtfe ya call it. For one, if he was, he`d be far more stylish, far more of a geek and a good bit more introverted with no girlfriend and an irate pet Shi-Tzu for a dog >_>; And yeah, OCs taking on major characters and winning has been done to death but since he went to a hard draw it wasn`t a TOTAL screw-up... Besides, I have plans for him that slightly required that, and he may grow on you when he actually get`s involved in the story a bit more.  
  
ZeonReborn - Don`t hurt me!  
  
Zinou - Thanks for readin` :D Not sure if my idea about the Shadow Fox is the same as your`s but ya never know... People just have a tendancy to overlook it, not to mention the fact that the Zoids themselves are often at least semi-characters in the shows.  
  
Sick Little Fiend - Hope to see another review from ya soon, hope I didn`t disappoint ya with anything.  
  
Aardwulf - Likewise, hope you leave another review for the story pretty soon, hope I didn`t go lower than what you expected or anything :\  
  
That`s all for now folks, _Sh33p_ out, see ya when I see ya. 


	7. Darkness Rising

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I don`t own Zoids.  
  


* * *

  
  


** New Age  
  
**Darkness Rising   
  
  
  


"And in other news, Raven Heights, the Super Maximum Security Prison used by the Gaurdian Force to house the most dangerous and/or powerful criminals on the planet posing a threat to the security of the world at large was all but destroyed last night by what survivors described as a 'flowing white beam,' fired from the peak of Mount Horus, hitting the most heavily protected portion of the entire prison facility and tearing straight through to the other side. While there are a few suspects at present, all can be cleared due to one of three reasons: Mysterious death, witnesses providing rock solid alibis and/or lack of motive. Those lost in the prison assault include Altiel Tairis, believed to be the former sub-commander of the Backdraft Group, as well as over a thousand other prisoners, gaurds and soldiers on duty at the ti-"   
  
Vega grimaced, flipping the channel off and settling his hands in his lap. It was all coming together alright, just as he had feared. Former Backdraft members were dropping like flies caught in a smoked up garage and everything tied together to lead to one suspect that Vega felt only he was knowledgable enough to pinpoint. Standing up and getting the heavy, lightly armored jacket he wore during battle off of the back of his chair, Vega slipped the piece of clothing on over his shirt and buttoned it up, grabbing his gloves a few seconds later.   
  
It was quite the change really, from a prison-like bedroom to a posh, Backdraft-provided suite to living in an old log cabin bought by his mother shortly before her incarceration. There wasn`t much love lost between Vega and Sarah but he wasn`t about to let her go down next, and he knew that he had until the pattern reversed to make sure that she didn`t.   
  
He also knew that he was the only target who didn`t fit into the pattern, he had no official rank in the Backdraft. None of the former Kings did, it was a miracle for the Backdraft Group as a whole that nobody in the ZBC had spotted any files about the project. _"I was wondering if he was alive,"_ Vega thought dryly, slipping his gloves on and sitting back down to put on his socks and sneakers. _"And now that I know, that means I`ve got to try and stop him from his next target... Unless he goes random,"_ Vega thought dryly, the other always did have that nasty habit of switching tactics at the worst times when Vega was trying to figure him out.   
  
Glancing out of the open window, Vega let out a whistle, listening to several deep rumblings and then watching as a certain silver colored, heavily armored Ultimate X padded around the cabin and came to a stop just a few yards away from the window. The Berserk Fury let out a growl, and while it would`ve sounded quite menacing to most, Vega thought of it in the same way most people think of a whining dog. He just happened to have a whining dog that was around thirty or forty feet tall, capable of blasting judge satellites out of existence.   
  
"I`ll be out soon Oeny, gimme a minute to finish getting ready!" Vega shouted, sliding the window shut a second or so later. 'Oeny' was his nickname for the Zoid most people called 'Death with legs' or other such nicknames. One could chalk the nickname up to the fact that in addition to being a prodigal genius at Zoid piloting, Vega also happened to be a slight addict for online gaming.   
  
Turning around and sliding the curtain shut, Vega grabbed his belt and made to put it on only to pause at the sound of the phone ringing. "Who the heck would be calling out here?" He asked himself lazily, walking into the kitchen and grabbing the phone off of it`s mount. Despite having little experience in cooking, doing laundry or much else domestically, Vega had adapted to living alone pretty quickly, answering the phone on the other hand was just as mundane as waking up in the mornings to take the Fury for a run.   
  
"Hello?"   
  
"Is this Vega Obscura?" A gruff, rugged sounding voice asked. "Yeah, who is this?" Vega asked in reply. "My name`s Harabec Davids, the owner of that resturaunt you visited a week ago," the voice identified itself. "I remember you, what can I do for you?" Vega asked. "For one, you can get a phone number that doesn`t take two days to dig up, for another, you need to watch your back," Harabec replied quickly. "Why`s that?" Vega asked, feigning not knowing what the man was telling him already.   
  
"About two days ago, a guy came in here asking if you had visited recently, then said he was going to try and kill you," Harabec informed grimly. "I figured as much... Did he ask if anyone knew where I was or anything like that?" Vega asked. "No, but I did tell him about the Blitz Team`s party a week ago," Harabec answered. "Alright. Do you know where their base is?" Vega asked, holding the phone with his neck and rushing to get his belt on. "It`s about five miles West of the city, why?" Harabec asked. "Because I want you to call up the Gaurdian Force and the Zoid Battle Commission both and try to get them to go out there now. Knowing him, he`s going to try and hit them soon," Vega explained.   
  
"Hold up just a second kid, who`s 'he?'" Harabec asked.   
  
"That isn`t important, just try and get reinforcements ready, I`m on my way to their base right now, bye," Vega finished, lifting his head and allowing the phone to fall into his hand before smacking it back onto the recharger and darting towards the door, buckling his belt at the last second. "Time to go Fury!" Vega yelled, racing around the corner at a fevered pace.   
  
  
"Things happen for a reason," Steven shrugged, getting his labcoat back on for the first time in over a week, shaking himself off in the process. "So you`re... Not mad?" Leena asked. "Not mad?" Doctor Tauros asked with a slight twitched, glancing down from the Shadow Fox at his daughter and then to Bit and Brad. "**_OF COURSE I`M MAD!_** But the Scout Fox is just so cool I can`t help myself..." Steve trailed off, big hearts visible in his eyes as he regarded the golden finish of the new Zoid. "It even has that new Zoid smell!" He shouted joyously.   
  
"Leave it to the Doc to look on the bright side no matter what," Brad mumbled sarcastically. "Well, at least now you aren`t servicing any Noise Marine Bubbas, right?" Bit asked with a snicker. "The next time you try to be funny Bit, think in advance and remember that you aren`t," Brad replied coolly. "Maybe if you had an inkling of a sense of humor perhaps," Bit grumbled. "I do, it`s just better geared than that of someone who thinks stealing Leena`s breakfast food is comedic when all it does is earn you a daily concussion."   
  
"Or four," Bit corrected. "I thought the record was five?" Brad asked. "Heck if I know," Bit replied hazily. "Well... That`s one disaster averted," Leena said, more to herself than anyone else. That completed, she languidly stepped aside and allowed the Doc to continue staring at the Scout Fox like it was some sort of Greek god. "Anyone know where Jamie is?" She asked quietly, itching for a change of subject. He had been acting a bit weird lately hadn`t told anyone why, it was a major change from the normally semi-cheerful teen they were all used to.   
  
"I think he went to town to go to the arcade or something," Brad shrugged. "He went to the arcade without me?! The nerve," Bit complained. "Now Bit, don`t get angry that someone else decided to pick on all the non-warriors _for_ you," Brad replied. "He`s been acting a bit odd lately," Leena cut in, trying to get the conversation back on-track before Bit and Brad broke into a wisecrack fest. "You noticed too, huh?" Bit asked. "Yeah, he`s moping around and doesn`t spend every spare hour he has trying to come up with battle plans that none of us ever listen to," Leena answered. "He`s probably just having a phase," Steven interrupted for a few seconds before turning back to the Scout Fox.   
  
"Probably, but even depressed teens aren`t _that_ bad," Brad muttered. "Actually, some are," Bit corrected. "Can it, blondie," Brad replied. "Make me, scruff," Bit shot back. "**_Anyway_**," Leena cut into, tongue in her cheek with an annoyed look on her face. "Could have something to do with the fact the jeep he brought back wasn`t one of our`s," Brad commented dryly. "Yeah, it didn`t have any boot marks from Leena flailing around everytime she see`s a sale going on," Bit replied with the same tone.   
  
"I resent that comment," Leena grumbled. "Maybe Doc`s right and he`s just going through a phase or something, go figure," Brad said with a shrug. "Speaking of the Doc..." Bit trailed off, looking around.   
  
"Oh," Leena mumbled for the group as they all looked up in time to see Steven pop out of the space between the eight barrels of the Plasma Gattling Gun, cackling like a lunatic.   
  
  
"Beck?" Abbie asked worriedly as Harabec grabbed his vest off of the rack he kept it on whenever working, tossing it around himself and hurriedly giving the place a once-over. "What are you doing?" Abbie asked again. "If the ZBC and the Gaurdian Force are too stuck-up about it only being a rumor when they`ve got bigger things to deal with, I`ll just go myself," Harabec replied sardonically, grabbing his gloves out of the vest pocket. "I`ll be back by tonight, if I`m not, call the police to head out to the Blitz Team`s base," Harabec stated grimly.   
  
"And while you`re at it, keep an eye on the news," he added, quickly speed walking for the door in a manner that left Abbie and the other three workers, as well as some of the customers, looking more than a bit perplexed.   
  
  
"Come on Oeny, can`t you make some better time than this?" Vega asked as the Berserk Fury rumbled along over the terrain of the mountain side, jumping several times and igniting the jumpjets in it`s legs to gain a bit more distance at every chance it got. The Zoid growled something of a negative in what seemed like an annoyed tone to Vega, who grimaced in reply. "I know you`re doing your best without the back boosters, but we can`t afford to be any slower! If he get`s there first, you and I both know that Bit and the others probably won`t be able to beat him, and if that happens, he`ll kill them just like he killed the Fuma team," Vega explained to the Zoid, hoping to draw just a bit more speed out of it if possible.   
  
His efforts paid off ever so slightly. "Yeah, you know that if Bit dies, you won`t get a chance to rematch with the Liger Zero," Vega commented with a smirk. The Fury rumbled something along the lines of an affirmative, skidding to a stop and igniting it`s jumpjet`s once again, sending the Zoid rocketing over what remained of the forested slope of the mountain before touching down on the edge of a lake and executing the jump again, going for even more distance and elevation this time.   
  
"Glad to see you`re as adament about this as I am," Vega commented, recieving nothing in the way of a reply from the Fury as it smashed down onto a small island and performed another jump.   
  
  
_ "You`re moping. Again." _ Jamie frowned to himself, taking another shot in the game at a creature that looked like something of a cross between a morbidly crafted zombie and a cyborg, just as the screen blurred around in a flash to zoom in on another horde of foot soldiers. Jamie squeezed the trigger of the game`s controlling rifle-like device, pressing a button on the side several times to chuck grenades into the mass of attackers. _ "You`re throwing off my skills, Bird-ass. Shut up,"_ Jamie replied after a few seconds with an uncharacteristic tone to his thoughts. _"Bird-ass? My, my, did someone wake up on the wrong side of the bed today?"_ The Wild Eagle asked. _"To say that I woke up on the wrong side of the bed is putting more credit to it than it deserves,"_ Jamie answered, taking a rarely grim satisfaction with detonating something into a mess of reddish colored gore, despite the fact that he would`ve usually just tried to ignore it.   
  
_ "Okay, you woke up sleeping upside-down on the bottom of the bed,"_ the Wild Eagle offered. _"More like upside down between the matresses with a lead weight pressed on the spot corresponding to my groin,"_ Jamie stated, ignorant of the sound of two quarters being dropped into the machine and a red crosshair coming up on the opposite side of the screen.   
  
_ "Well aren`t **you** just Mister Pleasant,"_ the Wild Eagle jabbed. _"I would be, if you hadn`t murdered around five hundred people,"_ Jamie snapped back, screwing up a shot and watching his health meter go down as a result. _"Closer to a thousand actually, but if I were you, I`d focus on the game before the girl beside you whips your score`s ass,"_ the Wild Eagle stated, apparently not suffering from the tunnel vision that his opposite was having.   
  
"Hi," Jamie offered. "You should try aiming more carefully," the girl replied, using single shots to start picking off the foot soldiers one by one with near-alarming speed, rarely using the grenades but always hitting her targets right in the head or the other weakest points when she did. "... You`re good," Jamie blinked, taking the time to spray down his end of things with slugs and grenades in a manner that left far less standing in a far shorter time, but left him having to reload sooner.   
  
"I play a lot," the girl offered back with a shrug, leaned forward with her head resting on the side of the weapon like a hunting rifle. "Oh... I`m Jamie, by the way," he offered, finally prying his eyes off of the game screen and glancing down to find the blue headed girl to be his own age from the looks of things, dressed in plain clothing that consisted of a pair of white pants, a white vest and a black, long sleeved undershirt.   
  
"Leyla," she offered back after a few more seconds, blinking herself at the way Jamie was successfully knocking down every single target in the air before it could even fire a shot. "Not bad yourself," she mumbled, standing up straight and offering a hand, which Jamie promptly shook before going back to the game.   
  
_ "Couldn`t tell me she was cute, could ya?"_ He asked annoyedly. _"Aww, Leena`s cute but you don`t have problems interacting with her..."_ The Wild Eagle chided. _"Leena`s also like a sister,"_ Jamie shot back. _"What about Naomi? She`s practically screaming '**SEX!**' everytime she wears that weird bathing suit-ish outfit of her`s,"_ the Wild Eagle asked. _"She`s also easier to deal with since she knows that and doesn`t taunt people with it,"_ Jamie grumbled. _"You of course realize I`m going to spend the rest of our mutual existence teasing the blue hell out of you over this, right?"_ The Wild Eagle asked.   
  
_ "Don`t remind me,"_ Jamie muttered, hosing down yet another of the in-game targets with grenades, even as Leyla picked off a bonus target that boosted her score up past his own. _"**HAHA!**"_ The Wild Eagle laughed over the fact that Jamie had just lost the high-score mark to girl who hadn`t been playing any more than ten minutes while he had spent the past hour gunning through the game relentlessly.   
  
  
There was a loud rumble, Leena toppled off of her feet for several seconds before she could get back up, dusting herself off and snapping a glance down the hall in time to see Brad stumble into a wall and prop himself up on one arm, just as the alarms started going off, screaming in the ears of the Blitz Team members as the entire base rattled again. "What in the hell is going on?!" Leena screamed over the roar of an explosion outside. "Don`t ask me, I was just taking a nap!" Brad answered hazily, trying to wipe the sleep out of his eyes.   
  
"Come on!" Bit cut into the conversation, jogging past Leena and Brad both towards the hangar. "What`s going on!?" Both yelled. "We`re under attack you twits! Come on!" Bit yelled back, vanishing down the hallway with Brad and Leena both not too far behind, though both had more trouble staying balanced than Bit did when the entire base kept rattling.   
  
By the time the two had caught up with him, Bit was already in the hangar, climbing towards the cockpit of the Liger Zero, which had only recently been refitted again with the original white armor after the hard-fought draw against the Shadow Fox. By the time Bit had finished climbing into the cockpit and getting it shut though, Brad was already headed towards the hangar bay doors, which themselves trembled with each impact from their unseen attacker.   
  
Leena was the last in line, her Gunsniper took a bit longer to get loose due to all of the maintenence that was still being performed on it.   
  
A few seconds passed as the huge garage door opened up, leaving Brad and the Scout Fox to slowly exit the shadows, though the silence was soon shattered as the assailant made his presence clear.   
  
Whoever it was wasn`t any ordinary attacker, the Blitz Team had faced the likes of that before on several occasions. This attacker though? This one had something the previous attackers had lacked. It wasn`t numbers either, each time the Blitz Team dealt with non-commissioned attackers, they always came in hordes of average-to-weak Zoids like Zabats or Demantids, relying on sheer force of numbers to overwhelm the skills of the Blitz and the power of their individual Zoids.   
  
This one though?   
  
To put it mildly, it was a stark contrast from the smallishly-crafted, nimble looking Scout Fox with it`s gold-painted armor panels and one major weapon in comparison to the solid black-and-red Genosaurer that had landed a few dozen yards in front of it. Brad grimaced, he was going to have to rely on every ounce of speed and stealth the Scout Fox could offer, not to mention every bit of ingenuity and resourcefulness he could bring to bear until Bit and Leena could get out of the hangar, which was promptly blasted shut by a pair of extremely precise shots from the three nose guns of the attacker.   
  
"Who are you?" Brad demanded over the broadband, setting the targeting reticule right on the chest of the enemy Zoid. He wasn`t pulling his punches, a few shots into the cockpit could mean he could end the fighting with a slightly-unfortunate death but it would also mean he would at least live to regret it.   
  
"Who I am doesn`t matter. My question does, and I`m only going to ask it once, so listen and listen good, and if you don`t get it right, you _will_ die before the end of the hour, is that clear?" The attacker asked, not speaking through visuals for some reason or another. "... What`s the question?" Brad asked slowly, using it to buy himself time to pick out a decent strategy for survival.   
  
"Where is Vega Obscura?" The attacker asked.   
  
"I don`t know," Brad answered truthfully.   
  
"Wrong answer," the attacker stated, bursting up and off of the ground at the same moment that Brad opened fire with the Plasma Gattling Gun, sending off a dozen bolts out into the desert to explode harmlessly while he threw the Scout Fox forward and into a zigzag pattern, waiting for the Genosaurer to touch back down before halting the Scout Fox, and opening up the tail.   
  
"It isn`t an EMP missile, but it`ll do," he commented over the broadband, letting loose with the quad-barreled 20mm machine gun, only to miss again as the Genosaurer simply sidestepped out of the way, twisting around and opening up with the nose cannons, which Brad swiftly managed to dodge by gunning to the side and swinging around on the Scout Fox` forward legs. "Don`t get it do you?" The attacker asked.   
  
"I don`t care what I don`t get, just stop attacking me or I`ll kill you!" Brad replied, adding fire to his words in the literal sense by opening up with the Plasma Gattling again, which the Genosaurer again dodged, touching down in-between the streams of fire and rocketting back up on it`s jumpjets before landing right behind and to the left of the Scout Fox. Brad had all of a quarter second to respond, but by then it was too late.   
  
The thick, black tail of the Genosaurer slammed into the side of the Scout Fox, throwing Brad up into the ceiling of the cockpit while his Zoid went into a sideways corkscrew through the air, landing awkwardly on it`s back and rolling over, back onto it`s feet with a shriek of challenge. "Fox and I didn`t like that," Brad growled.   
  
"And guess who doesn`t care? You suck and your Zoid isn`t much better," the attacker replied snidely, launching the Genosaurer up and off of the ground again and landing directly where the Scout Fox would have been -   
  
"All Zoid, no skill."   
  
- assuming it hadn`t cloaked, dove forward and twisted over to the right, just as the Genosaurer tilted up on it`s own right leg and kicked out to the side with it`s left, smacking the Scout Fox on it`s other side and knocking it over once again. Brad grunted and smacked into the side of the cockpit again, forcibly righting himself all over again, both in the cockpit and with the Zoid itself, finally taking the seconds to get the safety harness on with a dazed grunt as the cloaking unit lost power.   
  
"How did you know?" Brad asked.   
  
"You`re predictable," the attacker replied sternly, darting forward on it`s jet engines only to come to a skidding stop right in front of the Scout Fox, literally shooting one arm out and tearing through the smaller Zoid`s ears and the space that connected the jaw to the throat, squeezing tightly a few seconds later. "And you call yourself a Royal Cup champion," the attacker stated with audible amusement.   
  
"Yes, and I call you a total idiot," Brad replied hazily, squeezing the trigger and sending off bolt after bolt of plasma into the shoulder of the Genosaurer at point blank, causing the Zoid to stagger back before a series of shots from it`s nose guns put a stop to Brad`s efforts, which had succeeded in slagging much of the armor of the Zoid`s right shoulder.   
  
"I`ll give you one for actually having the common sense to pull the trigger at point blank. Too bad it doesn`t do you much good now that you`re about to die, huh?" The attacker asked, yanking the head of the Scout Fox up and down several times. To the small Zoid`s credit though, it proved far tougher than even Brad had hoped, withstanding the abuse and even continuing to struggle against the enemy`s attempt to behead it, though the Geno`s attempts had the added effect of causing Brad`s head to smash into the ceiling of the cockpit repeatedly, despite the safety harness.   
  
There was a distinct, sharp tearing sound as the cockpit glass started to crack, but it wasn`t the head of the Scout Fox, which finally flopped onto it`s belly - free of the Genosaurer`s brutal grasp - a few seconds later as a number of shots rang out.   
  
"You okay Brad?" Bit asked as the Liger and the Gunsniper both exited the hangar. "Been worse," Brad replied hazily. "My Command System`s frozen though... And I feel a li`l lightheaded," he said with a bit of despair before passing out. "Nice to know at least one of you might be a decent challenge since you don`t know where Vega is," the attacker cut in rudely, just as the Genosaurer kicked the doung Scout Fox over at the Liger and the Gunsniper, which both dodged out of the way. Brad, still trapped in the cockpit, was promptly knocked unconcious by the sheer force of the landing.   
  
"Who`s first?" The attacker asked.   
  
"Allow me!" Leena replied, lunging the Gunsniper forward and coming to a stop right in front of the Liger Zero, opening up with all guns in a wide pattern. "Leena! Don`t attack him alone!" Bit yelled over the broadband, though it was already too late. The Genosaurer was faster and more agile than it looked, easily dodging through the hail of gunfire, missiles, plasma and lasers to come to a stand directly in front of the Gunsniper, lashing out the very instant it had halted.   
  
"Oh crap," Leena muttered as the cockpit suddenly lit up like a Christmas tree, electricity coursing out of every panel and shocking her into unconciousness as the Genosaurer made a single, precision-based strike with it`s left grappler hand, stabbing through the Gunsniper`s armor and just barely managing to stab into the Zoid core, not enough to destroy it but certainly enough to knock the Gunsniper out of commission indefinately and leave every single system haywire in the process.   
  
By the time Leena`s screaming had stopped, the Genosaurer had gingerly kicked the Gunsniper off of it`s claws and shaken itself off as if it was a dog drying itself off after a quick swim. The Gunsniper staggered back several steps and toppled over onto it`s stomach, leaving only the Liger Zero to try and stand against the onslaught.   
  
"I don`t know why you`re doing this pal, but I`m going to make you pay for what you just did to both of them," Bit threatened sternly.   
  
"Then come and get me, _champ_," the attacker challenged with a near-audible grin.   
  
Bit let the Liger Zero answer the challenge for him, roaring loudly enough to shatter thin glass with ease before rushing forward in a zigzag pattern, avoiding impacts from the two heavy laser cannons mounted on the Genosaurer`s back, though Bit`s first attack was a miss since the larger Zoid dove forward and allowed the Liger to pass by, swiping at the smaller Zoid with the Genosaurer`s tail.   
  
That was the attacker`s first mistake.   
  
Bit dove the Liger underneath the Genosaurer`s tail, swinging around on it`s foreclaws and rushing forward, taking advantage of the Geno`s own momentum and slamming the Liger Zero into it`s right up at an off-angle, hard enough to throw the Genosaurer forward by several paces. "Ohhh, someone who can actually fight," the attacker said with that same thinly veiled amusement, wheeling the Genosaurer around as the Zoid roared out angrily.   
  
"Too bad for you, my friend here doesn`t like it when anyone plants a kiss anywhere other than on his ass, and you missed by a few feet," the attacker continued as the Genosaurer began to slowly pace around sideways in a circle with the Liger. "Why are you doing this?" Bit asked again.   
  
"Because I`m a weirdo and I needed to get my kicks out?" The attacker asked. "... You`re either a master of headgames or a total lunatic," Bit growled. "Take a wild guess," the attacker ordered as the Genosaurer came to a full stop.   
  
"I have a better idea," But replied as the Liger came to a stop directly in front of the Geno. "Meaning?"   
  
"**_STRIKE LASER CLAW!_**" Bit yelled, using the audio-based control mechanisms prevalent on some Zoids to trigger the attack mechanism of the Liger, just as the Zoid dove forward at full speed, achieved due to the usage of the booster on the Liger`s back. "You`re just as predictable as the other guy," the attacker snidely pointed out as the Liger approached, knocking Bit out of his fervor due to the calm, almost disappointed sound of his voice.   
  
"Wha..."   
  
Bit`s question was never quite answered the way he preferred. The Genosaurer jumped up on legpower alone, curling it`s legs up under it`s own bulk just long enough for the Liger Zero to pass half-way under it before violently extending them back down. The attack was something that would snap the Liger`s spine if it was an actual animal rather than a Zoid, but as it stood, it did what the other pilot had intended, smashing the Liger down into the concrete with enough force that it tore the Zero`s booster loose and knocked the hind joints out of alignment in a bad way, driving the belly of the Zero down into the concrete for several inches and leaving a pair of half-footprints in it`s back.   
  
Bit groaned, feeling a bit of the Liger`s pain and almost seeming completely incapacitated by it.   
  
"Come on pal, we aren`t done yet, are we?" Bit asked, trying to rouse the Liger up off of it`s stomach and back onto it`s feet while the Genosaurer jumped back off, landing a good distance away with a skidding turn to face the downed Blitz Team Zoids, which were all conveniently, by design or coincidence, lined up a few dozen yards apart, making it relatively easy to wipe them all out with one Charged Particle shot.   
  
Which is exactly what the attacker intended to do.   
  
There were two clamping sounds as the Genosaurer straightened up rigidly, extending it`s tail out and opening it`s mouth as far as it could, just as a white glow began to form at the tip of the barrel.   
  
"Maybe if you idiots were actually half as good as you claim to be, you wouldn`t be dead," the attacker commented dryly. "As it stands, see you all in Hell. Bye."   
  
"Come on Liger, **_GET UP!!!_**" Bit screamed at the Zoid, which only growled in reply and tried to haul itself back up to it`s feet, collapsing back down instantly as a result, just as the Genosaurer finished powering up for it`s assault. A split second passed and the world went white for Bit Cloud, even in the cockpit of the Liger.   
  
There was a thunderous roar and the white faded to the same colors as the world always had with a noticable gray shift, offset by a slightly pinkish tinge as Bit managed to get a glimpse of a certain, familiar silhouette in the space between the Blitz Team and death itself. It brought a slightly crooked smile to the Royal Cup champion`s face at the sight before he leaned forward with a groan and tried to bring the Liger up a second time, failing all the same.   
  
"Sorry I`m late," Vega excused. "Traffic was a little heavy," he stated with a grimace as the Charged Particle Beam came to a stop with one last pulse of energy that didn`t come anywhere near close to shattering the Berserk Fury`s energy shield, which was promptly deactivated a second later while the Zoid assumed a protective position between the Genosaurer and the Blitz Team.   
  
"I won`t let you go any farther," Vega growled with an uncanny resolve in his voice.   
  
"And I don`t need to. You`re my only target here, not these schmoes," the attacker growled with the same tone.   
  
"I hate to interrupt, but who in the hell is this guy?!" Bit cut in, figuring that Vega`s apparent familiarity with the attacker and last second timing could be chalked up to more than _just_ the combined luck of the Blitz Team members.   
  
"His name is Kale Obscura," Vega answered uneasily. "He`s my brother."   
  


_ End Chapter Six  
  
_

* * *

  
  
**Author`s Note:** Sorry this one took so long! Hope it was worth the wait though.  
  
**ZeonReborn:** Yep, Altiel died... Just after takin` a dump no less XD  
  
**Zinou:** Yeah, that always kind of annoyed me too. I guess it`s probably the same sort of thing that happens in any society as it advances out of the tribal-styled way that characters in CC lived. Well, at least it seemed tribal to me :P And yes, Altiel was in jail due to the crack downs on the BD group after the Royal Cup.  
  
**Sick Little Fiend:** Hope I didn`t take forever :P Been kinda busy working on a DBZ story called Generations that happens to finish off a series I`ve been working on most of the year so... You know how it goes, I`m guessing.  
  
**Shiro Amiyagi:** Right now, I`d say Marcus is the last issue Brad has on his mind. Don`t worry though, they`ll resolve things eventually. Keyword: **Eventually**.  
  
Also, if the description of the Scout Fox wasn`t perfect, I have a pic of it if you want to see. I wasn`t the creator of the Zoid but as far as I know, I was the first to use it in a fic and I probably changed it a good bit from the original.  
  
Hope ya like Kale so far, and no, he isn`t an author avatar either. All good lone super villains start out ten times better than the good guys, OC or not.  
  
Sh33p out. 


	8. The Brothers Obscura, Kale vs Vega

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I do not own Zoids.  
  


* * *

  
  


** New Age  
**_ The Brothers Obscura - Kale versus Vega   
  
  
  
_

"Your _brother_?!" Bit yelped in obvious shock. "And this surprises you, _how_?" Kale asked dryly as the Genosaurer growled a challenge to the Berserk Fury, which answered with a similar tone. "I thought you were an orphan or something!" Bit exclaimed. "Just keep quiet and try to get the Liger up, I`ll take it from here," Vega replied, promptly switching off the broadband and switching over to another channel, which he used to signal the pilot of the Genosaurer.   
  
"Why are you doing this Kale?" Vega asked uncertainly. "The Backdraft Group and the King Project are both dead, we don`t need to be fighting and you don`t need to be killing former members," he stated with a glare now that Kale was actually using video and audio both. "They may be dead, but they aren`t buried yet," Kale growled back.   
  
"Then I`ll have to stop you, here and now," Vega stated as the Berserk Fury lowered somewhat. "Just try," Kale challenged in the same tone, even as Bit made an effort to cut back into the conversation only to stop the instant he succeeded. It wasn`t just the fact that the two were brothers, it was also that Kale looked like an older, 'deader' Vega, almost to a tee. The similarities were enough to chill him into not saying anything at the sight of the two brothers who were now making ready to try and kill each other right in front of him.   
There was a brief pause as the two Zoids seemed to size each other up...   
  
Then all Hell broke loose.   
  
Vega threw the first shots, literally by opening up with the two beam cannons and trying to impale the Genosaurer on each attack, though Kale`s Zoid seemed faster, darting out of the way just before it could be hit each time, skidding along on it`s jets before coming to a halt a few dozen yards to the right of the Berserk Fury, bursting off of the ground and coming down towards Vega with a crash. To the boy`s credit, Vega swiftly managed to dodge the attack, further complicating matters by countering the Genosaurer`s tail with the Fury`s, smacking the two Zoids apart as a result, though the impact favored neither.   
  
"You`ve improved," Kale complimented. "So have you," Vega replied. "But not as much as me!" He added an instant later, lunging the Fury forward and stabbing out with the Buster Claws in a ruthlessly quick attempt to end the fighting at the moment it could begin. Kale sidestepped the Genosaurer out of the way though, rushing forward and extending his Zoid`s right leg up, kneeing the Fury hard in the chest and sending Vega back a few paces, though the boy quickly recovered and lashed out again with both triple Buster Claws in a double slash, which the Genosaurer just barely dodged out of the way from.   
  
Vega wasn`t done though, allowing the Berserk Fury`s own movement to carry it into a tail lash that finally succeeded in getting a hit on the Genosaurer, causing Kale to stagger back under enough force that a noticable dent had been left in his Zoid`s armor. "See what I mean?" Vega asked as the Fury wheeled back around to face the Genosaurer as it straightened up with a growl. "Not really," Kale replied, hunching the Fury over and opening up with a laugh, firing off the two heavy laser cannons once more.   
  
Vega barely dodged out of the way, sending the Berserk Fury off balance in a sideways jump and almost botching a landing as a result, but he was quickly able to recover, ducking down beneath another pair of laser bolts and lashing out with his own cannons, which Kale dodged away from by jumping into a sideways flip to his right, landing a good distance away from the Fury as a result.   
  
There was a brief lull as the two opponents sized each other up again and began to approach one another at a slow pace, suddenly breaking into a double jump through the air at each other. The Fury was obviously better equipped for a melee clash, sealing the deal by extending it`s Buster Claws out to either side and rotating them as quickly as possible, creating a double buzzsaw effect to literally slice through any sideways manuevering the Fury could perform, but Kale was also more resourceful and experienced than his younger brother, suddenly jet-bursting down to the ground and springing back up an instant later, just as the Fury began to pass overhead.   
  
The headbutt that followed sent the slightly larger Zoid into a backflip, a motion replicated by the Genosaurer, which allowed Kale to smash his Zoid`s tail across the back of the Fury`s hips, sending the other Zoid tumbling even harder while Vega struggled to regain control, stopping the Buster Claws and switching them back to neutral mode so that they were set firmly onto the back unit, held in place and aiming towards the Zoid`s back. After that, Vega chewed his lip and allowed the Fury to right itself instinctively using the jumpjets, landing in a wide legged stance while the Geno touched down gently a nice distance away.   
  
"Having fun yet?" Kale asked angrily. "Laughing over the fact that you`ve gone nuts, yeah," Vega answered snobbishly, buying time for the Fury to recover from it`s fall. "If you call seeing the truth for what it is and taking up the mission to see it through insanity, then that really doesn`t speak too highly of you, little brother," Kale replied coldly. "Takes a headcase to know a headcase," Vega shot back.   
  
Kale replied in actions rather than words, opening fire on Vega with his nose-mounted cannons. The eleven year old prodigy was barely up to the reflexive task of dodging out of the way, bringing the Fury into a forward run and jumping the first stream of shots, which struck out into the Blitz Team hangar by default, then skidding along beneath the second, which again hit somewhere in the Blitz Team hangar as a result.   
  
"I see your aim`s still off on moving targets," Vega commented as the Fury dove forward, landing on one foot and then jumping ahead the last distance with an odd looking spin-kick that knocked the Genosaurer right off of it`s feet and into a roll. "Not quite," Kale replied as the Genosaurer blazed up off of the concrete, landed with another skid and twisted around, tagging Vega thrice in the chest with the same guns the younger fighter had so adequately dodged seconds before, even though Vega was already in mid-air to follow.   
  
The Berserk Fury tumbled along through the air, it`s own weight carrying it through even the force of three high impact shots into the chest, where it was met by the Geno`s thick tail, which lashed across it`s chest with just as much impact as the gunshots, leaving a visible imprint in the heavy armor of the other Zoid, but it was still a mistake on Kale`s part. Vega broke from his normal style, using the short, stubby arms of the Fury to lock onto the tail of the Genosaurer and sling it off of the concrete runway of the Blitz Team base and onto the desert ground well over a hundred feet away with a thunderous explosion of dust and dirt, which promptly cleared when the Geno emerged a few seconds later, blazing through the air on all thrusters and coming to a stop directly in front of the Berserk Fury, though by the time Vega could get the Zoid to react to his own reflexes, the Genosaurer had jumped up again and brought both clawed feet to stab brutally into the chest armor of the Fury, throwing the larger Zoid into the air again while the Geno balanced on it`s own tail and Kale sent off another three shots into his brother`s Zoid, tagging it repeatedly in the chest.   
  
Vega let out an audible grunt as the Berserk Fury slammed down onto it`s back, swinging up to it`s feet once again and shaking it`s head for a few seconds as if dazed. Vega grimaced to himself. "Guess you _did_ fix your aim," he muttered in thinly veiled annoyance. "And a whole lot more. I`m better than you can ever hope to be now," Kale growled. "Then prove it and stop bragging," Vega shot back with a growl. "Have it your way."   
  
Vega`s ears registered two loud clamps as the footlocks of the Genosaurer slipped down and held it in place while he wheeled the Fury around, glaring daggers at the Zoid his brother was piloting, even as the Fury`s mouth began to glow a near solid white, edged by a flurry of other colors.   
  
There was a thunderous roar as the Geno fired off it`s Charged Particle Cannon, but Vega was able to swiftly dodge out of the way, leaving the beam to continue on and slag a perfect crescent into the outer walls of the Blitz Team base, streaking off into the desert miles away to eventually dissipate after a few seconds, leaving a visible trail of distortions in the air as a result.   
  
Vega on the other hand, was already closing the distance with the Fury on it`s feet alone, having seemingly baited Kale into locking himself into place, but the older of the two brothers was cagier than Vega had expected, firing off the boosted of the Geno and literally tearing it`s feet free, venting all of the excess, super heated exhaust into the Berserk Fury`s face with it`s rigid tail in the process. The footlocks slipped back into place as the Genosaurer touched back down, tail once again bending to either side as the last of the exhaust out.   
  
Vega grimaced the instant after though, just as the Fury turned to face the Geno with a roar. _"He`s misted over the eyes with the exhaust from his tail... Crap,"_ Vega thought, keeping silent for the most part and allowing the Berserk Fury to know his fears through the slight emotional connection the two had. "Blind, huh?" Kale asked with a smirk. _"Crap again, he knows,"_ Vega thought dryly. "Who say`s overkill never accomplishes anything, eh?" Kale asked as the Genosaurer began to slowly pad along towards the Fury, quietly, even while the other Zoid ferally lashed out in any direction it could detect sounds in.   
  
"Cheap," Vega growled angrily. "The cheapest tactics are always the most effective, shrimp," Kale replied with that same smirk as before, sending a chill down Vega`s spine. The boy only narrowed his eyes though. "Have it your way," he growled again, spending a split second yanking open a panel in one of the upper-forward consoles, having to stand to reach close to the ceiling, then turning a knob that altered the volume of what was broadcast into the otherwise sound-proof cockpit of the Fury.   
  
"If I can`t see you, I`ll just listen to you," Vega muttered, narrowing in on Kale`s location by the fact that the other of the two brothers had been in the middle of a step when Vega had finished adjusting the volume. "Is that so?" Kale asked cryptically, just as the Fury lunged forward, rebounded off of the concrete a few yards to the Geno`s left and made a sideways dive, it`s own left Buster Claw-arm extended to full, claws closed together and glowing a magnificent blue during the charge, whirling with the speed of the fastest chainsaws and aimed to stab through the Genosaurer`s chest and sideways into the cockpit.   
  
"Too bad for you," Kale stated when Vega failed to reply, skipping the Genosaurer backwards and allowing the Berserk Fury to land directly in front of him at near point blank. "**_NOW!_**" Kale yelled, causing the Genosaurer to roar as loudly as it could, right into one of the main audio recievers on the Fury`s head, causing the larger, more powerful Zoid to shriek as well, filling Vega`s cockpit with enough noise that Kale could see blood beginning to trickle out of his little brother`s ears, the boy`s face contorted into a painful wince, gloved hands pressed fervantly against his ears an instant later as tears forced themselves to fall due to the pain in his ears.   
  
Kale allowed the Geno to stop roaring an instant later, kicking the Fury squarely in the chest once again a second later, sending the other Zoid down for the count. "Now your Zoid is blind, you might be on the verge of going deaf and you`re crying like a little girl... Tell me Vega, who`s _still_ better than you?" Kale asked as the Genosaurer began to stomp around the downed Berserk Fury.   
  
"If you were half as good as you claim to be, you`d`ve seen my next move coming from five miles away," Vega chided as the Fury forced itself upright, claws already extending outward to full as the body went rigid, a blur of pinkish energy setting up around the Zoid`s body for a split second before it faded to a myriad collection of colors with an orange-and-pinkish overtone, catching the Genosaurer right in it`s path and throwing the other Zoid well over a hundred feet away, where it crashed back down into the concrete of the runway-area with a thunderous roar, shattering the nigh-indestructable terrain it impacted on with an enormous guyser of dust and debris.   
  
"How`s them apples?!" Vega demanded, reaching up again to lower the volume back down to saner levels and wiping his eyes and ears off with his other hand. "All Zoid, Vega," Kale replied as the Genosaurer emerged from the cloud that had formed around it, dented and dinged up but still almost unscathed aside from previous damages. "Still no skill," he finished with a smirk. "That`s why I just sent you off like a field kick, huh?" Vega asked sharply with the same smirk. "I`m not the one tearing up left and right with my ears bleeding now, am I?" Kale asked.   
  
"Not to mention I`m not the one hiding behind a god damned _energy shield_!" He exclaimed accusingly. "Use it if ya got it," Vega replied nonchalantly, using the time to catch his breath. "Good idea, which is why I`ll use the fact that none of your friends can move to get you to drop that shield and fight me like the man you`ll never be," Kale replied, biding his time to step towards the downed Blitz Team, taking slow, almost torturous paces that lasted close to seven or eight seconds each.   
  
Vega didn`t even bother with a witty comment or an insult, dropping his energy shield almost instantly. The Fury growled uncertainly. _"We can see now, we can beat them,"_ Vega thought, using his general emotions to try and soothe the Zoid. The Fury withdrew it`s Buster Claws again, growling over at the Genosaurer once more with a fierce, new glow to it`s eyes.   
  
"Pep-talking your Zoid with your emotions, huh?" Kale asked. "How`d-" "Rookie," Kale interrupted sourly, just as the Genosaurer lunged forward at full, rocket boosted speed to slam violently into it`s opponent with it`s undamaged shoulder, throwing the Berserk Fury back a few more feet, though the other Zoid held it`s balance briskly thanks to it`s tail, shoving the Geno back again and smacking it across the cheek with the Fury`s own snout.   
  
The Geno backed down and growled challengingly, blasting forward once again, but this time, Vega was ready, throwing the switch to drop the footlocks and holding the Fury in place even as the Genosaurer connected with a brutal impact that would tear even the Elephander off of it`s feet, but the Fury held it`s ground, forcibly pushing the Genosaurer back and smacking the attacking Zoid repeatedly with it`s own head like a hammer, sending Vega around like a rag doll in the cockpit even while the Geno tried to scratch and stab the Fury in the side with it`s free claws, the others having been held out of attack-capable movement thanks to the Fury`s own right arm.   
  
"Footlocking on me, huh?!" Kale demanded, seeing through the tactic as the Genosaurer touched it`s feet down, deactivating it`s jets for a split second. "I can solve that easily!" He yelled, launching the Geno again but only with one leg going forward, using the other to go backwards, trying, and after a few seconds succeeding, in ripping the Fury off of the ground, sending the larger Zoid crashing onto it`s back in a near-Judo-like slam, holding it down with it`s clawed grappler arms.   
  
"Give up yet?!" Kale demanded sharply. "You fell for it again," Vega replied dazedly, managing to get up one hand to the monitor and flip Kale the birdy while flipping the switch that would activate the Fury`s shielding, the Zoid`s Buster Claw-arms already tearing loose, skinning the ground in several directions while extending fully and spreading open.   
  
"Not exactly," Kale replied sharply, holding the Geno aloft on it`s surprisingly powerful arms and bringing it`s knees crashing down into the Fury`s chest once again, finally shattering the armor enough that the black under-skin of the stronger Zoid was plainly visible beneath it.   
  
"Try and activate your shield now Vega, you`ll get baked just like me!" Kale exclaimed knowingly. "Maybe, maybe not," Vega replied, willingly letting the shield finish activating and again throwing the Genosaurer into the air as a result, though this time the other Zoid trailed smoke and particle streams in it`s flight to hit the ground again.   
  
Kale regained control though, flipping the Geno back onto it`s feet and watching the Fury drop it`s shield and right itself with an awkward roll backwards that would implode the necks of most Zoids of similar size. For the Fury? The armor on the nose simply became bluntly rounded off and a little scrunched looking, nothing more.   
  
"This may take longer than I thought," Kale finally admitted begrudgingly.   
  
"Oh, it`ll take you longer than you`ll live, Kale," Vega threatened defensively.   
  
"Unless I stop _playing_ with you like the _little boy_ that you are," Kale replied cryptically.   
  
  
_ "Well, that could`ve gone better,"_ Jamie thought with an off-cynicism as he left the arcade. _"... You got whipped in five games by a girl..." _The Wild Eagle muttered accusingly. _"Shut up,"_ Jamie griped quietly, tucking his hands into his pockets and pausing to crack his ankle ever so slightly. Bad enough he was only just now beginning to learn how to fly the Raynos - or any other aerial Zoid - worth very much, worse that his alternate personality had almost single handedly slaughtered close to, or over, a thousand people on a sick promise and even worse _still_ he had spent the past week doing little more than moping, detracting from his already meager standing with the Blitz Team, now he had just had his proverbial tail whipped by a girl who probably couldn`t pilot a Zoid if her life depended on it.   
  
And speaking of said-girl...   
  
"Hey! Wait up!"   
  
Jamie glanced over his shoulder in genuine surprise to see Leyla, grinning from ear to ear like an idiot, exiting the arcade with a cart-load of toy Zoids still in their packages. "... You cleaned up with the prize stamps," Jamie mumbled in disbelief. _"Way to state the obvious, dolt,"_ the Wild Eagle chided. _"... Will you just **SHUT UP** already?!"_ Jamie demanded, hiding the internal arguement with a slightly bemused smile. "Yeah, gonna give all this stuff to my little brother... He`s a nut for Zoid battles so..." Leyla shrugged.   
  
"I see..."   
  
"Not really helped by Dad and me being a Zoid team but... Ah well," she grinned again. "... Wow, you`re a Zoid warrior?" Jamie asked, head tilted to the side as he felt about twenty pounds seem to lift off of the chained-up weight that was blocking his ability to communicate at the moment. "Yep," she replied proudly. "Class S, been in for close to five years," she added with the same expression. "Class... S..." Jamie felt the twenty pounds fall back down as eighty.   
  
_ "... Is it just me or does **everyone** suddenly seem to join whatever class the Blitz Team gets into by default?"_ The Wild Eagle asked in shocked sarcasm.   
  
_ "... For once I`m agreeing with you,"_ Jamie replied in the same tone.   
  
"Anyway, I was wondering if you`d like to have lunch sometime since you seem to be a big arcade fan and all," Leyla stated, perhaps a bit shyly but still with a bit of enthusiasm. "Actually, I`m not that big of an arcade play... er... Well, sure I guess..."   
  
_ "**FEEL THE SMOOTHNESS!**"_ The Wild Eagle shouted with a tone of voice so utterly fake that Jamie could almost taste artificial flavoring as a result. _"Just. Shut. Up. Now."   
  
"But I like seeing you squirm, damnit!"   
  
"You aren`t being funny. Shut up."   
  
_ "Hmm... I`m going out of town for a week so... Next week then?" Leyla asked with a smirk. "Food Court?" Jamie asked. "That`ll work," Leyla replied before getting ready to drag the cart off. But she stopped.   
  
And stared.   
  
Right into Jamie`s eyes with that look like a curious animal regarding something shiny.   
  
"You`re eyes are weird," she stated plainly, leaning up for a closer look. Jamie leaned back a bit to the extent that he almost fell over as a result but somehow kept his balance, twitching out a fake smile and fighting off any urge to sweat from nervousness. "How so?" He finally managed to ask, coming off without any trembling in his voice, surprisingly enough. "Each one has two reflections..."   
  
_ "... Shit, she knows,"_ both Jamie and the Wild Eagle thought in unison. "Cool looking actually," she said with a shrug, backing down and walking off a few seconds later. "See ya next week!" She said with a large wave, leaving Jamie to stand there, absolutely dumbfounded with only a meek wave and slightly mortified expression on his face.   
  
  
Vega coughed and looked back up from his lap and into the slightly-fuzzed up monitor in front of him, glaring daggers and knives over at the Genosaurer, which had just - for all intents and purposes - smacked the Fury around like a rag doll caught in a tornado filled with two ton lead weights. He felt dazed, he knew he was out of his league and he knew that Kale was just prolonging the inevitable at this point.   
  
Slowly and unsteadily though, Vega coaxed the battered Fury to stand again, even as the armoring on the upper legs trembled and shook, having been cracked at several points during the relentless onslaught that the Zoid had just gone through. Both arms hung limply out in front of the Fury`s form, both Buster Claw arms were snapped off and several teeth were missing, among other things.   
  
"If you`re going to finish me, just hurry up and get it over with," Vega growled angrily, finally forcing his left eye to open up somewhat, even though the bruising of the skin next to it had almost swollen it shut. To his credit, Vega was enduring far more punishment this time around than he had before, even when he was fighting Bit in the Royal Cup championship. "I think I will," Kale replied snidely, allowing the Genosaurer to take several steps back from the wobbling Fury, roaring out of it`s own superiority to the other, more powerful Zoid.   
  
"Tell me Vega, who`s better?" Kale asked.   
  
"... You aren`t the Kale I knew," Vega spat at the part of the monitor that showed the comm-screen with Kale`s face on it.   
  
"I guess you`re right there," Kale shrugged, unphased by the comment. "But who`s better?" He asked again.   
  
"Do I really have to answer that?" Vega asked.   
  
"Yes."   
  
"Then I guess that means that in addition to having become an arrogant ass, you`re now officially b-" "That`s enough o` that," a new voice cut in on the conversation, which had switched over to broadband at some point or another, though none of the Blitz Team was going to even try and interrupt at this point. Brad and Leena were both still out like lights and Bit was too busy reeling from the pain that was being telegraphed to him by the Liger.   
  
"Eh?" Kale and Vega both sounded, glancing to the direction of the town to see a single Zoid standing atop a hill a few dozen yards from the runway the two had been waging their war on. "I`m afraid I`m gonna have to break this little dance up," the figure said again as the Zoid, clearly identified as an unmodified, custom painted Rev Raptor, black with a golden-finished crest on the head, began to step forward, towards the battlezone.   
  
"Idiot," Kale muttered. "Whoever you are, leave now! He`ll kill you if you don`t!" Vega warned, even though he was promptly shut up as the Fury toppled forward, now baring several new impact marks on it`s head from the nose guns of the Genosaurer. "Shut up," Kale growled, turning the Geno to face the incoming Rev Raptor. "Who are you?" He demanded.   
  
"Aww, come on," the voice taunted. "Don`t tell me you forgot me so soon," it said again, just as another viewscreen flipped into place on the monitors of the two combatants. "You?" Kale asked in thinly veiled amusement, possibly tinged with a bit of insult.   
  
"_Harabec_?!" Vega yelped in shock. "Run away!" He ordered with a yell, trying to get the crazy old fool to take a warning. "So... Today I`ll have slaughtered a bunch of chumps, a little kid that thought he could run around as my equal and an old guy who thinks he can actually make me listen to him... This is almost funny," Kale said aloud. "Actually, it _is_ funny... You damned dolt," Harabec replied with a smirk, the razor stubble on his lower face contorting up with the skin beneath it. "`Sides... I may be a bit wrinkly, and I may be about ten years outta practice, but I ain`t _that_ old and I can still whip a snot-nosed little punk like you without even trying."   
  
"Wanna bet?" Kale challenged, a bit angry now. He wasn`t exactly prideful, but someone insulting his skills wasn`t exactly something he tolerated. "Why bother betting when I`d just win anyway?" Harabec asked dryly. "You honestly think a damn Rev Raptor is going to take _this_?" Kale asked, utterly amused now. "Yes, actually," Harabec replied plainly. "You`re either senile or legally insane," Kale replied with a tinge of audible disgust.   
  
"Well then... Why don`t you be a good little boy and fire the first shots at me, hm?" Harabec asked mockingly. "Have it your way, dumb ass," Kale answered, taking quick aim and opening up with his nose-mounted cannons once again.   
  
He missed spectacularly. Harabec had already dodged by the time that Kale had finished pulling the trigger.   
  
In a near impossible display, the Rev Raptor dodged forward, avoiding every single shot that Kale could get off while hopping around, never even coming close to being hit in the process. Explosions sounded through the desert around the base while the smaller black-and-gold Zoid jumped onto the runway, swiftly dodging underneath a number of heavy laser shots as Harabec spoke up again.   
  
"Lesson _one_: Do _not_ underestimate someone `cause of their Zoid," Harabec stated, even whilst the Rev Raptor, bounded to stand just beside the larger Geno Saurer, jumping up by the time that Kale could react and swiftly, precisely kicking the nose of the other Zoid, perfectly stabbing through the sides of the guns mounted there in an odd looking sidekick, landing swiftly an instant later and darting underneath the Geno as Kale moved to try and kick his attacker, missing once again and stomping down into the ground by the time that Harabec had risen back up and swiftly deployed the scythes of the Rev Raptor, slashing twice across the base of the tail and the right hip of the Genosaurer, sending off a maelstrom of sparks as a result while turning again and whipping the very tip of the short tail of the smaller Zoid across the trails, deepening the cuts as a result.   
  
"Lesson _two_: Just because an opponent ain`t packin` the same size and strength as you doesn`t make `em weaker, case in point: This."   
  
Jumping straight up, the Rev Raptor again lashed out with it`s right foot, leading a stabbing kick into that same hip and propelling itself up to land a second kick, this time with it`s left, straight into the gun mount for the two having laser cannons, slicing into the main portion of the guns as Kale let out a yell and tried to twist the Genosaurer around hard enough to fling the Raptor off.   
  
His efforts partially succeeded, the smaller Zoid went flying into a backflip, somehow managing to rebound off of the top of the Blitz Team hangar bay doorframe and come flinging back, landing hard on both feet and springing back up with a reverse headbutt across the chin of the Genosaurer, tipping the huge Zoid back just a bit and exposing the chest region completely.   
  
Kale leaned back into his seat and gulped as the front of the cockpit tore open and a razored finger stabbed through, stopping only inches away from his face in the process.   
  
"Lesson three: There are reasons why I was named the Revered Raptor, the same reasons why I was the Class S champion for four years straight and the same reasons why I just handed you your snot-nosed, punk ass. I really hope these lessons got through that thick, idiotic little skull of your`s, `cause I ain`t repeating myself, got it?" Harabec asked, the communications setup of the Genosaurer somehow having survived what had just transpired.   
  
"Crystal," Kale muttered, not moving for honest fear of being sliced in half. "Good. Now, I`m gonna let ya go, and if ya ever give my customers any trouble again, I won`t stop a few inches short, `kay?" Harabec asked angrily.   
  
"I can`t give a promise I won`t keep," Kale replied drly. He didn`t exactly _want_ to die but at least if someone like Harabec killed him it wouldn`t be a death to be too ashamed over. Besides...   
  
"You won`t kill me... You don`t have the guts for it," Kale exclaimed confidently. "You`re right. I don`t. Unfortunately for you, I still have the guts to cripple your Zoid if I have to. _Don`t_ come near this town, or this base, _ever_ again. I`ll take your Zoid apart piece by piece with you inside if you do, is that clear?" Harabec asked.   
  
"Sure... But Vega won`t be here forever," Kale growled. "Probably not," Harabec shrugged. "And just so we`re clear on this, you`re not that much better than they are," the veteran stated insultingly, drawing the claw of his Rev Raptor and taking a step back. Kale smirked, the old timer may have been _very_ good, but he was still quite gullible.   
  
"Oh, and one more thing..."   
  
Or so he thought.   
  
There were three distinct explosions in the ears of Kale and the others who were actually concious or able to even pay attention at present as the black Rev Raptor stabbed the Genosaurer three times in three exact locations, the first being the joints of the shoulders, each scythe easily slipping into the too-tight space and stabbing right into the inexplosive parts of each rotational motor before a jump and a third slash finished things off, stabbing hard into the throat of the Genosaurer and disabling any chance of using it`s Charged Particle Cannon.   
  
"Just so we`re clear on that, right?" Harabec asked snidely while the Rev Raptor backed off, taking up a protective position in front of the downed Berserk Fury and the even more banged up Zoids of the Blitz Team.   
  
"... Just... Crystal..." Kale growled.   
  
"Good. Now get the _Hell_ outta here before I change my mind," Harabec ordered sternly. "You can`t protect them forever you old bastard," Kale threatened. "And I`m not going to," Harabec replied as the Genosaurer flared up and off of the ground, blasting skyward as best as it could in it`s damaged stated, heading for only Kale-knew-where.   
  
"Now that we got that squared away," Harabec muttered, more to himself than anyone else, lowering the Rev Raptor down to crouch on it`s belly with it`s chin resting against the runway, cockpit opening up a few seconds later while the Berserk Fury`s own followed suit, though Vega was more concerned with helping the downed members of the Blitz Team that gaping at the show of skill that the older veteran had just put on without even breaking a sweat.   
  
"Guess I`m not half as rusty as I thought," Harabec said to himself, picking up into a light jog towards the downed form of the Liger Zero while a dazed Steve Tauros emerged from the hangar, holding his head in one hand and a pistol in the other. "Call some ambulances Doc!" Vega yelled, manually opening up the Liger Zero`s cockpit and trying to drag Bit out before the older pilot shooed him away and climbed out on his own, still cradling his back sorely.   
  
"And get Brad and Leena!" He managed to yell annoyedly, collapsing back against the muzzle of the Liger, feeling the Zoid`s pain for all it was worth and hating every second of it. "Alright, both of you stay here and try not to move to much, I`ll get the others," Harabec ordered grimly, running hard towards the other two downed Zoids.   
  
It was going to be one of those days...   
  


_ End Chapter Seven  
  


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_

**Author`s Note:** And now you know why you never piss off ornery bar tenders who need to shave more often...  
  
**Shiro Am_a_yagi:** Yay, I spelled your name right this time! Hope you liked the Scout Fox pic I sent ya, not to mention the action in the story so far.  
  
**Aarwulf:** Good to see ya back :D Hope I haven`t let you down with Kale or Harabec so far, but both play important roles where they`re involved. And no to anyone who dislikes OCs, Harabec won`t be the main character. For god`s sake, the guy`s retired! You`ll get a nice bit of info on him eventually though, same for the base and a few other things... Including some things that`ll come right outta left field on you.  
  
Glad someone actually liked Doc`s reaction to the Scout Fox... I dunno, I could just SEE HIM doing that...  
  
And for anyone who`s interested, the next chapter contains some vital info as to the condition of the Blitz Team, as well as a good bit of action on that lucky rookie bastard, Marcus Harlock! Not to mention you`ll see what I mean by 'coming outta left field' on ya pretty soon...  
  
And to the people who`ve enjoyed the story so far, leave a review please! Not required to get more updates since I don`t like holding my stories hostage depending on how many people like them but still.  
  
Sh33p out. 


	9. Ivory and Shadow

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I don`t own Zoids, but I do own roughly 80% of the OCs in this story(the others were either thought up or inspired by friends)  
  


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**New Age   
**Shadow and Ivory   
  
  
  


Mark grit his teeth. Five seconds ago, he had just succeeded in making the win in a Class C battle royal that awarded the winner passage into Class B, a promising addition to his burgeoning 5/0/1 record of wins, losses and draws. It hadn`t been that hard really, mainly since Marcus, despite being a green-behind-the-ears rookie to the core, had a Zoid that was more or less a seasoned veteran, not to mention independent enough from him that it tended to correct most of his mistakes before someone could take advantage of them.   
  
Unfortunately, five seconds ago that hadn`t mattered much.   
  
Five seconds ago he had won a Class C battle royal, but three seconds ago, the Shadow Fox had let out a shriek of surprise and cocked it`s head far back, finding a high intensity field blade held a mere foot from where the mechanical joints connected the neck and the shoulders. Three seconds ago, Marcus had felt the joy of victory sap right out of him, replaced by a good bit of inexperienced fear.   
  
"Paying attention now?" A voice asked over broadband. "... Well gee smart guy, there`s a Blade Liger threatening to take my partner`s head off for no apparent reason, what the hell do _you_ think?" Marcus asked sarcastically, using humor to hide intimidation. "Figured as much. I`m guessing you don`t know who I am, correct?" The voice asked. "And I could care less either way," Marcus answered dryly. "Well... Too bad for you. My name is Kyle Mazemia, you`re going to agree to battle me - tomorrow - around the Torador Heights. If you don`t, your Zoid becomes headless."   
  
"... Well, when you put it like _that_..."   
  
"That`s what I thought."   
  
"Question for ya though," Marcus spoke up, casually allowing the Fox`s Laser Vulcan Gun to slide up and out of forward-only firing mode, swinging around to place the barrels at an angle that would ensure numerous hits on the other Zoid`s cockpit.   
  
"Do you like Swiss Cheese?" Marcus asked. "... Swiss Cheese?" Kyle replied. "Yes, cheese with lots and lots of holes in it," Marcus explained lazily. "Wouldn`t know, why?" Kyle asked. "Because if you`d pry your eyes off of the monitor long enough to look up, you`d see that if you don`t remove that blade from my pal`s throat, I`ll put enough holes in you to qualify as Swiss Cheese," Marcus answered dryly.   
  
"... Fine, be that way," Kyle grumbled, backing down as the blade of his Zoid withdrew back into place, swinging up onto the Blade Liger`s back. "Much better," Mark stated, drawing the Laser Vulcan Gun back into forward-only firing mode. "See you tomorrow," Kyle stated, his Blade Liger jumping straight up and corkscrewing sideways over a canyon wall, running off into the early morning light a second later.   
  
Fox growled.   
  
"... Hell if I know, but is it just me, or do we attract weirdoes by the truckload?"   
  
Fox shook it`s head gently before sidestepping a downed Sabre Tiger and walking gingerly towards the opposite end of the moonlit battlefield, intent on getting back to it`s trailer attached to the Gustav and taking a nice, long break. It wasn`t that the Shadow Fox was 'tired,' as Zoids go, but it had just taken a liking to being lazy when the chance arose.   
  
  
Brad growled beneath his breath, trying to ignore the bandage that was presently wrapped around his head. The former owner of the Shadow Fox and the present owner of the exceedingly banged up Scout Fox was seethingly angry, to the extent that it was actually showing for once. Not discomfort either, not even that broodingly annoyed or overly determined kind of expression he could have at times, but full-on flushed anger, to the extent that his face was turning red.   
  
Beside him stood Bit, who was probably the only the only member of the Blitz Team at present who wasn`t sporting a bandage of some sort. He was obviously stiff in the back though, even at a distance he could still feel echoes of the kind of pain the Liger was going through. He bore a more resolute expression than Brad, his eyes were also moving from left to right quite frequently.   
  
Beside them both stood a few others, chief among them being an uncharacteristically sick looking Steven Tauros, who also bore a bandage around his head, though not half as overdone as the one that Brad was sporting. After that there were Oscar and Jamie Hameros, Leon Tauros - who bore a similar expression as his father, a _very_ determined, temporarily wheelchair bound Leyon Martin, and rounding out the group was Stigma Stoller, who bore a slightly less sedate version of his usually reserved demeanor for once.   
  
In front of this motley group were two glass observation windows. In one room was the boy by the name of Vega Obscura, who was presently going through a number of procedures to make sure his hearing and sight hadn`t been damaged beyond recovery, among other things. He was looking worse for wear despite his usually cheerful demeanor, still bruised to Hell around one eye and still having a bit of trouble thinking straight.   
  
In the other room was a girl by the name of Leena Tauros, who was presently being treated for the kind of electricity-based injuries people would expect from a victim of a lightning strike rather than any Zoid battle. To add to the troubles, she was also currently in a near-coma-like state from the painkillers and such that had been pumped into her system to try and ease her into a state where she wasn`t constantly twitching around and breaking the needles embedded into her arms. There was serious doubt as to whether or not the girl would ever fully recover.   
  
The group of seven were the only visitors currently allowed. Harry Champ had done everything from place heavy demands to trying to bribe his way through to be allowed to even look at Leena, and to his credit, he was still trying even now. The only reason he wasn`t being allowed in was that Stigma had won the rat race and gotten through first.   
  
Stigma was also soon the focus of Bit Cloud`s concentration.   
  
Not to mention his voice.   
  
"What do you know about Kale Obscura?" Bit finally asked, stiffly turning to face Stigma. "... He`s Vega`s older brother. Anything else, I can`t say," Stigma exclaimed bluntly. "You owe me an explanation Stigma," Bit growled. "I don`t owe you anything. Technically, none of this would`ve happened if I hadn`t left the Backdraft Group to fight you one time in an official battle," Stigma replied. "Stigma, a guy claiming to be Vega`s older brother has my daughter in the hospital in a near coma, two of the members of my team are injured and it`s going to take the rest of the Royal Cup prize money to pay for repairs and medical bills, not to mention the damage to my base. If you don`t tell us, Bit can always pry the information out of Vega," Steven growled angrily, looking half-ready to take the other man`s head off.   
  
His words got through anyway, even if they obviously infuriated Bit that anyone would insinuate he would try to do such a thing.   
  
"Kale Obscura was the first of the Royal Five, the subjects of the King Project. He was followed by his younger brother Vega, then by Rayth Takahori, Randal Clark and Alfred Torson. Vega was the youngest, he was inducted at the age of two, while Kale was the second oldest, he was about seven years old when their mother, Sarah Obscura, had their father killed to stifle his objections and his attempts at gaining legal custody of the boys," Stigma began to explain, watching Vega`s expression the entire time. "All of the Royal Five endured harsh conditions, only Vega seems to have emerged without it having destroyed his personality. He still has infrequent flashbacks and nightmares as a result though, Kale went insane and Rayth vanished just as his sole friend outside the program, a young man named Kyle Mazemia, broke away with Rayth`s sister a full month prior to the Royal Cup tournament."   
  
"What about Torson and Clark?" Oscar asked.   
  
"Torson commited suicide. Vega killed Clark during a battle. It was the Backdraft`s attempt to make pure warriors, fighters who could carry the torch of the organization into battle from day one to their retirement, when they would begin training their own successors. The Royal Five, children intended to be the Kings of Battle. All of the survivors had emotional scars from it though, Kale went insane around the time that the map to an old 'tomb' of sorts was found, showing the location of four Genosaurers and the Berserk Fury. My guess is that he hijacked one of them since only three attacked the Royal Cup. Rayth became a total introvert, and an angry one at that. Vega... Well, Vega somehow stayed about as normal as anyone can. He still loves Sarah, he calls me 'Dad' at times and somehow doesn`t seem to realize that he was used as a puppet in a gigantic game by his own mother."   
  
"Bar the flashbacks and nightmares," Jamie reminded. "Yes. As well as the fact that he refuses to let anyone live with him. I think he either saw it all coming or somehow developed a subconcious fear of being around groups of people, let alone anyone qualified as a Zoid warrior."   
  
"Then how do you explain the fact that he seems to think of me like a brother?" Bit asked. "Kale was like you before he snapped. Do the math," Stigma replied dryly. "... I see," Bit finally nodded. "That explains who the guy is, but why did he attack us in specific?" Brad asked. "My guess is that he figured you would know where I have Vega hiding, and he probably doesn`t know that the Helic and Guylos legal systems both have me listed as Vega`s adoptive parent," Stigma mused. "Kale isn`t the most thorough person about searches or planning. In battle it`s another story but outside of that, he doesn`t tend to focus too much on details like who know`s what," he added.   
  
"In other words he thinks like I do," Bit commented darkly. "Warp your thoughts into plans for a killing spree and yeah, you about have things right," Stigma replied.   
  
"At least now we know what we`re up against," Brad finally spoke up again. "Yeah," Bit agreed, shifting his gaze back to the still-unconcious Leena as the nurses made way to let in a doctor. "The lot of you aren`t up against anything. This is Vega`s fight, try interfering and you`ll just be killed," Stigma explained grimly. "I _beat_ Vega before, Stigma, and why aren`t you helping?" Bit asked angrily.   
  
"Because I`d just get in the way. If I was younger and in my former prime I wouldn`t have any issues trying to join Vega, but as it stands, I`d just be a liability to him now," the old veteran said with a shrug. "What happened to the fire you had when you challenged me to an official battle?" Bit asked challengingly. "It got snuffed out when I realized just how outdated I am," Stoller answered. "So you`re just going to let someone you consider your legal son die because you`re afraid you`d get in the way?" Brad snorted.   
  
"This isn`t my fight, it never was and it never will be. I`d just cost Vega concentration he`d need to survive," Stigma answered gravely. "I know what he means," Oscar cut in, turning around to make his leave and getting Leyon`s wheelchair by the handles. "Take care Steven, if she wakes up before I`m out, tell her I said to get well soon," Leyon ordered as he and Oscar left. "You comin` Jamie?" Oscar asked, pausing at the door. "Nah, I`m kinda busy here," the younger Hameros answered plainly. "Got it. I`ll be with Leyon if ya need me," the older stated before letting the door slide shut behind him.   
  
It hadn`t even finished closing by the time it had been yanked open again and a seemingly totally healed Harry Champ burst into the observation room, going all but airborn and plastering himself to the window of Leena`s room, followed a few seconds later by a familiar woman in her mid-thirties, escorted by a man in the uniform of a member of the Gaurdian Force.   
  
"I`ll be leaving now. Bit, you know my number, right?" Stigma asked. "Yeah, I`ll call you when Vega get`s transfered to a room you can visit him in," Bit answered, stiffly turning back to glance at the silver haired owner of the Elephander as he left. The woman who had entered came to stand directly in front of Vega`s window, watching the boy with the eyes of a mother who had obviously been more than a little heartbroken over a good many things in too short a while to deal with it all.   
  
"I`m guessing you`re Sarah?" Steven asked. "Yes," she replied. "I was always afraid this would happen," she said with a sigh. "Welcome to the club," Steven replied cryptically, still staring at his daughter.   
  
  
He had been early to the battlefield, again. It wasn`t a matter of just being earlier than the opponent to finish waking up or anything like that either, Marcus had learned after his second battle that it paid to know the battlefield at least as well as the opponent he was going to face off with. Given his green status as a rookie, it was a stroke of luck combined with a decent amount of intelligence that had lead to the conclusion, though the Shadow Fox had originally gotten the idea to case out the battlefield for their third battle.   
  
"How long do you think it`ll be, Fox?" Mark asked quietly, sipping down what was left of his morning coffee and letting the Zoid control it`s own movement for the duration. It only growled something along the lines of not knowing in response though, tilting it`s head to either side once it arrived at a clearing. "... Remind me to teach you how to tell time as more than a few minutes at once someday," Mark murmured, chucking the empty cup into the floor and placing his hands on the controls.   
  
There was a rustle in the distance, a good ways behind and to the left of the Shadow Fox, causing the Zoid to instinctively lunge forward into the opening and skid around to face the incoming sounds. "Yeah, I heard it too. Any idea why this guy singled us out to fight?" Mark asked. The Fox growled something along the lines of an insult at it`s pilot. "... Oh, so I`m a friggin` newbie to Zoid battling, so sue me..."   
  
Fox growled again.   
  
"To do that you`d need a lawyer."   
  
The Fox snorted.   
  
"There`s a visual I didn`t need," Marcus cringed, glancing down at the scanner before being jarred straight once again as an explosion howled in the distance. "I hate when they do that," he muttered, leering off to the right at the rising cloud of smoke that was coming from where the Judge Capsule had landed. "Find `im yet?" Mark asked, glancing down to the scanner. The Shadow Fox growled a negative.   
  
"Then we`ll just have to level the mountain side if he doesn`t show in the open," Mark surmised, earning another growl from the Fox. "Ah come on, like you haven`t ever wanted to fry Smokey`s ass back to the stone age either," the former 'trucker' chided as the Judge began laying down the rules.   
  
"**The area within an eight mile radius is a designated Zoid Battlefield. This zone is now restricted. Only competitors and personnel have authorized entry. All others must leave the area at once... Area scanned, battlefield set up. Marcus Harlock versus Kyle Mazemia. Battle Mode 0992. Ready... _FIGHT!_**"   
  
Marcus heard a loud ring and felt the Fox dive back on it`s own, watching the ground the Zoid had formerly been standing on become a mess of tortured craters under a hail of plasma, bolting from somewhere down the mountainside. "So, he`s able to fight at both range and melee," Mark observed, allowing the Fox to do it`s thing and dodge again, just trying to take things in for now. He had learned at the fourth battle that it paid to let the Fox do most of the work at the start of a match, deciding that he was a better strategist than a pilot for the time being.   
  
Another pair of bolts honed in, this time significantly longer and more powerful than the first salvos, also coming from a slightly different angle and shooting through the trees. The Fox nimbly sidestepped though, growling something to Marcus. "Agreed. He`s either got multiple guns or that Blade Liger`s been a bit souped up," Mark said aloud, just as the Shadow Fox began to charge down the mountainside, still dodging bolts of plasma in the process, and narrowly dodging more than a few falling trees as well.   
  
"Mind if I take over now?" Marcus asked, putting his hands back onto the controls and waiting for an answer, just as the Fox jumped through the air, erupting out of the forested canopy of the mountainside and clearing a great deal of distance in an unexpected move, growling midway. Marcus felt a small tingle in the back of his head and promptly squeezed the controls for a moment as a result of the Zoid`s signal, kicking in the boosters in the back legs and sending the Zoid farther down the side of the mountain, finally landing with a number of crushed trees, followed by bolts of plasma the entire way down.   
  
"Kinda hard to believe this guy`s just a B`er," he said to himself, wheeling the Shadow Fox around with a skid as it landed, opening up with the Laser Vulcan Gun in a wide spread that turned a good portion of the forest into a nicely cleared trail, finally revealing a distant speck of pinkish-orange light in the distance. "Zoom in," Mark ordered, disengaging the Laser Vulcan Gun from forward-only and elevating the weapon into turret mode, promptly using the audio commands to zoom in on the speck until it took shape as the shield dropped.   
  
"... Damn," Marcus finally muttered before pulling the trigger. It wasn`t that he hadn`t seen the Zoid before, but he had never seen it in great detail. The night time wasn`t exactly the best time to view more than silhouettes or things of that nature, even though the glow of the field blade had told him that the Zoid was at least white. Seeing it in daylight though through the zoom ability of his partner meant that he could take it all in with far more clarity though.   
  
And Marcus was quite impressed. Not just over the fact that the other Zoid had dodged his shots, but more so due to it`s appearance. Blade Ligers, be they the real deal or enhanced Shield Ligers with fancy nicknames, were rare. In all of his life, Marcus could recall seeing only one real Blade Liger, and even that had just been on television. Leon Tauros and the Red Blade Liger had been a unique happening in the world of Zoid battling, but now they were just part of an exceedingly small club. This was a different Liger though, it was white, more ivory really, with the same orange cockpit glass as the Red Blade, as well as the same general shape. This one was just a small bit bigger though, and the blades looked straighter and sharper than on the other Blade Liger.   
  
"... Crap, where`d he go?" Marcus muttered, smacking himself on the forehead for having gotten caught up too much in admiration of the other Zoid to keep on it with the guns. Thankfully, the Shadow Fox had gussed that much and started dodging around ahead of time, growling out something that equated to 'fanboy' at it`s pilot. "Shut up," Mark ordered annoyedly while his partner dove them both into another cluster of trees, which promptly started shredding.   
  
"... Oh," Marcus replied, watching the trees tumbling down in an ecliptical pattern that was closing towards a circle, taking control once again and lunging the Zoid forward. There was a curse over the broadband and two Zoids went tumbling down the side of the mountain, seperating with a number of loud cracks and explosions before skidding sideways to a stop, both somehow winding up on their feet with only a few scorch marks to either.   
  
"Sneaky bastard," Marcus commented. "It pays to fight dirty," Kyle audibly shrugged. "Question though, O white challenger," Mark taunted. "And that would be?" Kyle asked while the two Zoids started circling each other. "Two actually," Mark corrected himself before continuing. "For one, how in the hell is a guy like you in possession of a Blade Liger? For another, why in the hell did you pick me?"   
  
"I crashed into a mountain after a match with a former friend, he found me a few hours later. As for your other question..."   
  
"Wait, let me guess... You figured I was all Zoid and wouldn`t put up a good fight if my life depended on it."   
  
"Pretty much."   
  
"Cheap."   
  
"Not to mention that I didn`t count on your Zoid being able to correct all of your screw-ups... Rookie," Kyle snidely stated. "Besides, how did _you_ get a Zoid like _that_? Doesn`t Brad Hunter own that thing?" Kyle asked with an audible smirk. "I won it in a card game," Mark mumbled out a few seconds later, causing the other fighter to burst into laughter.   
  
Coincidentally, it was at the same time that the Zoids themselves burst at each other, tearing wildly from their circling pattern and swiping at one another with their foreclaws before the Liger dodged to the side and swiped one of it`s blades forward, an attack with the Shadow Fox narrowly dodged, socking the other Zoid squarely in the chin with it`s hind legs while jumping the Liger`s attack, landing on it`s forelegs onto to be kicked hard in it`s own chin by the Blade Liger, slinging it right off of it`s own feet and landing hard on it`s side in a manner similar to what happened to the Blade Liger a fraction of a second earlier.   
  
Both Zoids were back up in a blur of movement that seemed more akin to an explosion than actual, physical movement.   
  
"Not bad," Kyle commended as the Ivory Blade Liger shook it`s head several times as if to clear itself of a daze. "I could say the same for you," Mark replied. "Could if it wasn`t for your Zoid having made the dodge, that is," Kyle corrected with a bit of smugness to his voice. "Better to admit that I suck than to enslave my partner to being a braggart," Mark shot back with annoyance.   
  
"... Enslave? He picked me! How the hell am I enslaving him?!" Kyle demanded. "... Okay, so I didn`t pick the right words, whatever," Marcus grumbled, pulling the trigger and sending off a pair of shots at the Liger, which ducked down out of the way, both blades extending back out to it`s sides.   
  
"Let`s try that again, shall we?" Kyle asked as the Blade Liger charged forward, darting out of the way of another pair of shots and passing the Shadow Fox in it`s run, the other Zoid just barely avoiding getting cleaved in half. "Don`t you ever stand still?" Kyle growled angrily, wheeling the Blade Liger around only to find the Shadow Fox`s right forepaws slamming down into the head of his Zoid, just next to the cockpit as Marcus answered in the most plain, mundane voice possible.   
  
"No."   
  
With that, the Fox forced it`s claws to sink in a bit further, then worked with Mark`s own attack to throw it`s weight back and then boost with it`s legs up into the air, essentially flinging the Blade Liger along on the ground and burying it nose-first into the dirt. It was apparent to Kyle that most of the manuever had been the Zoid`s doing, Marcus was still too green to have ever hoped to do such a move.   
  
The Ivory Blade Liger recovered quickly though, rebounding off of it`s forepaws and springing back, managing to kick the Fox squarely across the left shoulder and sending the smaller Zoid skidding back on all fours to the incline of the base of the mountain as a result.   
  
There was a brief pause in fighting as the two Zoids broke into a run alongside each other around the base of the mountain, ending sharply as the Blade Liger switched barrels to a gattling configuration while the Shadow Fox switched over to turret mode with it`s main gun.   
  
Gunfire broke out sharply a mere second later.   
  
  
_ "God damned crusty old son of a bitch,"_ Kale growled in thought, throwing aside another car battery after unplugging the jumper cables from it, then grabbing yet another random battery of some sort, this one an battery for the energy guns on a Zabat, and hooking it up to the cables, then using a combination of a tazer and a rubber glove to get the power to start transferring, causing the Genosaurer to growl slightly in discomfort as it`s pilot effectively shocked it`s systems into repairing themselves. It was a crude and old, but still effective way of forcing a Zoid to repair itself, going so far as forcing it to regrow it`s own armament after a while.   
  
_ "If it hadn`t been for him, I`d`ve killed every last one of them and gotten away with it,"_ he growled again, grabbing another battery and - after a quick climb and a fairly crazy balancing act - hooking it up to a second set of jumper cables, attaching these to the badly shredded barrel of the Charged Particle Cannon, causing the Zoid to again grunt and growl in discomfort.   
  
"Shut up," Kale ordered sternly, balancing on one of the Zoid`s teeth before swinging around and out of it`s jaw entirely, landing on his feet on the Geno`s right forearm, then jumping the rest of the way down to land on his feet again, forcing the shock to subside through sheer force of will. The Zoid almost whimpered in submission at how Kale had ordered it around, but it didn`t quite give in as expected.   
  
_ "I`ll get Vega anyway, it`s just a matter of time,"_ he thought to himself in disdain, stepping over to the small campfire he had going and grabbing his jacket up out of the small rucksack that carried all of his clothing. It was getting cold out now, Kale might have been durable but he didn`t like being uncomfortable. There were fine lines between insanity, dedication and stupidity, and Kale wasn`t exactly intent on crossing the line to stupidity a second time in two days.   
  
"You know, if it weren`t so pathetic, it`d almost be funny," a new voice stated, just as Kale turned around and stared up the side of the steep wall of the crater he had decided to camp out in for the duration. "If you were sitting there for an hour waiting on me to get my jacket just so you could tell me I`m pathetic, get a life," Kale ordered insultingly, turning around again and pausing in his walk at the green, six and a half foot tall Organoid that had appeared in his path when he was talking to the as-yet-unseen voice hovering just out of sight at crater`s edge.   
  
"... If this is all you can use to intimidate me, don`t get a life, just kill yourself," Kale ordered again, nonchalantly stepping around the Organoid and continuing back to the Genosaurer. "Now why do that? I haven`t finished my mission in life yet, just like you haven`t finished your`s," the voice stated, just as a man with short, dark and slick black hair stepped out from the shadow of the Genosaurer`s right leg, regarding the disinterested youth before him with malignantly green eyes, visibly bagged due to the deathly pale coloring of his skin.   
  
"So you have the balls to actually show yourself. I still don`t care, leave," Kale ordered dryly, reaching into the pile of batteries he had accumilated over the past week and making ready to climb up the Zoid`s leg again. "Oh, but you should. I can help you, you know..."   
  
"In other words you`re here to offer me the usage of your pathetic little Organoid in order to repair my Zoid, then you`ll charge me to work for you to accomplish numerous tasks which you yourself either don`t care enough about, can`t do yourself or just don`t want to dirty your hands with," Kale surmised rapidly, promptly twisting around and smacking the Organoid across the side of the head with the battery, sending it down on it`s side for several seconds before it tried to get back up.   
  
It was met again by the same battery that had just knocked it down. This time, it didn`t get back up.   
  
"Spectacle didn`t like that," the man stated calmly. "And I don`t like either of you. Go away or join him on the ground," Kale threatened. "All I ask is that you perform a single job for me and I can make your mission infinitely easier... You se-" "I don`t care. Get the hell out," Kale replied, starting to climb up the side of the Geno`s leg a second later. "... Have it your way. When the world starts burning, don`t think you`ll be spared," the man stated gingerly, casually moving over to the downed Organoid. "Get up Spectacle," he ordered.   
  
The Organoid groggily replied by hoisting itself back up with a disoriented growl, shaking it`s head off a few times before splitting open in the gut. The man vanished inside a second later, and the Organoid also vanished immediately after, blasting up into the sky in a green bolt of energy and vanishing over the horizon, leaving Kale to go back to what he was doing without a shred of care about what had just happened.   
  
All he cared about was getting back to work and permanently burying what was left of the Backdraft Group, regardless of the cost.   
  
  
Kyle groaned, heaving the Blade Liger back up once again and glancing over the schematics display to check for damages. That last tumble the two had taken had been quite a doozy, sending the Shadow Fox careening down on a straight line through what was left of the forest on the Eastern side of the mountain and the Blade Liger tumbling down right after it, getting smacked by every tree that didn`t snap on impact with the Fox, which was actually quite a lot.   
  
"Was that you or your Zoid?" Kyle asked.   
  
"Given the way Fox is bitching at me about taking stupid risks, I`d say it was me," Mark replied dryly, smacking himself on the side of the head to try and get his sight unblurred. It wasn`t exactly the soundest method but really, the guy had just knowingly sent two Zoids that massed in at around a hundred and seventy-five tons down the side of a mountain at close to a hundred miles an hour, could someone really expect the guy to have much common sense at the moment?   
  
"I`ll take your word for it," Kyle stated, just as the blades of the Liger switched back up onto it`s back and then tilted forward while the Zoid`s forelegs bent at the elbows, causing the weapons to aim straight for the Fox, which narrowly avoided a dual stream of fire while jumping into the air. "Me and my pal have a nice trick for ya!" Marcus exclaimed, just as Kyle started to adjust his aim.   
  
"**_STRIKE!_**"   
  
_ "Thinks he can take me like that?"_ Kyle thought sourly, switching the blades back into inactive and then pulling back the two joysticks in a fairly basic pattern of movements as the Fox started coming down.   
  
"**_LASER!_**"   
  
"No thanks!"   
  
"**_CLAW!_**"   
  
There was a blinding flash and the fighting came to an abrupt, bright pause once more, with the Shadow Fox held aloft, claws glowing bright and golden and embedded deeply into the layers of shielding around the Ivory Blade Liger, which held it back despite the smaller Zoid`s sudden jet boosting downward, leaving Marcus and the Fox unbelievably annoyed and Kyle and the Liger counting their blessings.   
  
"You bastard," Mark growled as the Fox raked it`s way down the shield. "I aim to please!" Kyle exclaimed as the primary booster of the Liger flipped up into view and activated, driving it forward and into an inevitable battering ram, the kind that would end a fight if the Fox yielded just enough to go off balance and topple onto it`s back. "Too bad for you that you`re point blank then," Mark stated after a loud shriek from the Shadow Fox.   
  
"Because unlike you, I don`t have to aim!"   
  
That second, the barrels of the Laser Vulcan spun out rapidly and went to work, firing off a steady stream of energy into the shield of the Blade Liger, while the Double Impact Cannon slipped back down out of it`s hiding place and started firing off in unison with it, slowly wearing away at the Blade Liger`s shield reserves and generally beginning to cause Kyle to break into a cold sweat.   
  
"Shit," Kyle growled, intentionally dropping the shield and bursting forward, ramming the Fox at near point blank and slinging the Blade Liger`s head straight down, embedding it`s saber-like fangs right into the crook of the Fox`s neck while the Fox blew a number of holes into the Liger`s gut, both Zoids being pressured together by their own thrusters before finally, the Liger`s booster stopped and Kyle swung the Zoid to balance on it`s hind legs, suplexing the Shadow Fox over and onto it`s back, ripping off both of the Liger`s longest teeth and leaving them stabbed into the neck joints of the Fox while the Fox`s shots took their toll before stopping.   
  
Both Zoids were left flat on their backs as a result, with Fox growling something that translated as a few dozen expletives followed by 'cursed, bastard-children of a can of white paint and Mister Bigglesworth.' Mark honestly didn`t even want to know, so he simply didn`t ask.   
  
Both Zoids again rolled back to their feet, though the rise favored the Shadow Fox for several seconds until the damage caused by the teeth caused a fairly inconvenient blast to tear through the Fox`s shoulder on the side of the neck that the teeth had stabbed into.   
  
"So much for that win streak," both pilots grumbled in unison as their Zoids growled out insults at one another. "Draw before we kill each other?" Mark asked calmly, trying to ignore the cries of protest from both Zoids. "Liger`ll probably kill me anyway, but heck..." Kyle shrugged. "We`ll have to rematch sometime," he added as the Liger turned to leave. "Assuming my girlfriend doesn`t slaughter me the next time I see her, sure," Mark replied while the Fox stubbornly held it`s ground, shrieking out insultingly at the Liger.   
  
"See ya next time, newbie," Kyle stated, leaving Marcus to fester in his own annoyance while the Fox continued screeching out challenges, insults and accusations at the Liger. It was obviously becoming clear that while Mark might have taken a dislike of being a rookie, the Shadow Fox was starting to get a phobia for white Ligers.   
  
  
"Waking up?" A distant-seeming voice asked, both familiar and a bit unfamiliar at the time. "Man, look at the crust in her eyes," another voice cut in amusedly. "That`s my daughter you`re talking about!" A third voice interrupted. "And even with sleepy eyes she`s still beautiful as ever," a fourth made itself known. "Nice to see some things have yet to change," a fifth, distinctly feminine voice added with thinly veiled amusement as Leena finally managed to pry her eyes open.   
  
"Anyone got the name of the Gustav that hit me?" She gurgled out with something of a lisp, clearing her throat and wondering exactly why her vision was so blurred. Her skin felt as though it were covered in tape, being jabbed with god knows how many sewing needles and rounded off with friction burns and she could vaguely register feeling a blanket covering her body below the area of her armpits. "About time you woke up," a familiar voice said as an even more familiar hand ruffled some of that orange-pink-reddish hair on her head. "We were worried that you had gone into a coma," another equally familiar voice, the third from earlier, explained with concern.   
  
"My eyes`re kinda blurry," Leena complained. "You got shocked with the equivelent of a lightning bolt going off on you at point blank," yet another voice explained. "That you Jamie?" Leena finally asked, narrowing her eyes a bit to try and make out the hazy form at the foot of the bed. "Yeah, it`s me. Leon and the Doc are at the head of the bed next to you, Naomi and Harry are standing next to them and Vega and Bit-" "Are being pains in my roasted ass," Leena complained. "Nice to know even lightning can`t get through a skull as thick as your`s," Naomi commented with a good natured jab at her younger rival.   
  
"Nnngh... It`s nice you`re all concerned and everything, but... Whoever`s holding my hand right now..."   
  
"Yes, my sweet?" Harry asked, giving a squeeze that made Leena wince. "Let go before I rip your arm off and beat you with it," Leena ordered annoyedly.   
  
Things were finally beginning to go back to normal again...   
  


_ End Chapter Eight  
  


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_

**Author`s Note:** Yeah, bit o` OC action, a few curtains lifted and two characters who had only appeared before this back in chapter two or three(whichever) being introduced once again. Doubt anyones even gonna remember how they were first shown :p  
  
**Shiro Amayagi:** 'Omae o korosu?' Erm... I`m guessing that means something bad o_O; Don`t worry too much, I may be needin` a break for a while before I resume actual work on the story since I recently blew out my writer`s stamina finishing up Generations x_x;; Don`t worry though, I started this one and I`ll finish it even if it means taking it down, gutting the story and re-posting it to it`s completion, no matter the cost!  
  
**Zinou:** Yeah, just don`t skim it or ya might miss a foreshadowing of something enormous... *Snort.* I seem to have developed a knack for doing that lately >_>  
  
**Aardwulf:** Hope you enjoyed the OC action in this one, don`t wanna let ya down or anything... Harabec and Abbie will show up again soon enough no doubt, but not the next chapter. Hope ya liked some of the twists in this one!  
  
Sh33p out, leave a review and see ya next time!  
  
**EDIT:** And yes, please **_DO_** kill me if I miss spell your name again... Eesh. Sh33p back out, later. 


	10. Welcome to Class S! Blitz Schlag!

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I do not own Zoids.  
  


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** New Age**  
Welcome to Class S! Blitz Schlag!   
  
  
  


"They call themselves the Schlag Team," Jamie stated mundanely, leaning back into his chair in the hospital room while Bit and Brad sat across from him, with Leena and the Doc placed across the room, one in bed, the other sitting next to it. "They`re another new group to Class S, won in on a thirty win streak through the Guylos Official Tournament. Not too well known since they aren`t one of those super loud mouthed teams, low key and thought out. They each use the same type of Zoid with small changes her and there, ranging from cosmetics to actual arsenals," Jamie explained, holding up a finger at Bit to shut him up before he could ask the question.   
  
"Blade Liger Simulacrum, Shield Ligers that`ve been modified to simulate the arsenals of real Blade Ligers. They aren`t quite the same though, no shield and their blades don`t feature any built in blasters, but they still have missiles and added a pair of light machine guns to the head, above and aft of the cockpit," Jamie informed, answering Bit`s question ahead of time. "Sounds like a decent challenge," Brad stated with his usual drab tone. "'Decent' isn`t the word I`d use for it Brad. These guys kept their streak going even after they got into Class S, adding another three to their tally before they issued the challenge to us. You two are in for some major Hell when you fight them," Jamie retorted with a sigh. "What about me?" Leena spoke up.   
  
"You aren`t up to get out of bed right now except to use the bathroom, Leena, let alone pilot a Zoid," her father answered sternly. Steven Tauros was probably one of the only two human beings alive at present who could tell Leena what to do and get away with it. The other was Leon Tauros, her brother. "... I hate when you`re right," Leena growled annoyedly. "Why isn`t Jamie fighting?" She asked.   
  
"Because I`m still waiting for the Raynos to have it`s wings glued back on," Jamie answered in a fierce growl, glaring daggers over at the Doc. "Mainly since someone practices a bit of favoritism," he added annoyedly before going back to the laptop he had on the table. "Anyway..."   
  
"Who`re the Schlag Team members anyway?" Bit asked. "Let me see... Victor Weathers, Canon Petresun and Ambrose Gierling are their main team, Verity Weathers is their back-up rotational pilot and a guy named Solomon Gierling is their sponsor/strategist and tactician," Jamie answered after a few seconds. "A brother and a sister, a vet and a father and son," Brad mused. "Actually, Verity is Victor`s wife," Jamie replied with a snicker. "Ah, so the great Brad Hunter`s skills of reading people begin to fail," Bit pointed out. "I only heard their names, Blondie. Shut up," Brad replied casually, taking another sip of his morning coffee.   
  
"Anyway," Jamie cut in. "It looks like it`ll be a two-on-three, or a two-on-four. Think you two can handle that?" The young strategist asked. "Depends, did you get the Liger`s transformation armors repaired yet?" Bit asked. "Panzer wasn`t damaged, Zero is still lacking a fresh re-coat of paint, not to mention it`s main booster, and Schneider is pretty much finished. Surprised how quick you guys put the Liger back together in the first place after the number that psycho did on it," Jamie mused. "We work fast when we`re angry," Brad and Bit both stated at the same time.   
  
"I`ll take your word for it... Jaeger won`t be usable for another few days though and Zero is a major risk since it`s primary booster is out of commission still," Jamie stated. "That Harlock guy did a number on the boosters," he added annoyedly. "So we`re basically stuck with the Liger being unable to go to either of it`s choicer armors," Bit grumbled. "Good thing the Scout Fox isn`t that hard to repair," Brad muttered. "Either way, you two have your work cut out for you..." Jamie stated, leaning back and glancing out of the window.   
  
"Then why in the blue hell are you smirking like an idiot?" Brad asked dryly.   
  
"... I`m not smirking..."   
  
"Yeah you are," Bit pointed out. "And you`re blushing too," Brad said with amusement.   
  
"... Is it that obvious?" Jamie asked. "Yes," Bit and Brad answered again. _"Smoother than glass,"_ the Wild Eagle chided. _"Shut up,"_ Jamie shot back instantly. "Uhm..."   
  
"What do you think, Brad?" Bit asked gingerly. "I think she`s... 5'8", Jamie`s age or a bit younger, bluish hair, tan, perceptive and good natured," Brad pointed out after several seconds of pause, leaving Jamie`s mouth to hang open to the extent that his jaw was virtually coming unhinged. "Nice," Bit commended. "Nah, you just gotta know how to read his breathing," Brad replied.   
  
"... How the hell did you know that?" Jamie gaped. "Because I`m just that damn good," Brad replied with a shrug. "So, what`s her name?" Bit asked smugly, kicking his feet up onto the table and grinning like an idiot. Brad all on the other hand, kept to sipping his coffee and delighting subtly in the torment he was inflicting. Sure, Jamie was his team mate and all that, but it didn`t mean that Brad couldn`t have a good deal of fun at his expense, right?   
  
Bit on the other hand...   
  
"Her name`s Leyla, let`s leave it at that," Jamie growled, reaching across the table and roughly shoving Bit by the feet, causing his chair to topple over and sending the Royal Cup champion crashing to the floor. "Besides, you two have your match in only one hour," he pointed out. "Then we`ll just go get ready," Brad shrugged, getting out of his seat as Bit scraped himself off of the floor, nonchalantly stepping on the blonde youth`s chest in the process and shoving Bit back down to the floor on his way out.   
  
  
"They obviously can`t be _that_ good if one Zoid trashed the whole team after a rookie drew with their best member," Canon stated dryly, leaning back in the backseat of the cockpit, watching the clouds drift by as the Schlag Team-owned Hammerhead II trailed through the stratosphere at mach one. "On his first match no less," Canon added sourly. "You underestimate them too much," Solomon commented, continuing a few seconds later. "People don`t win the Royal Cup on luck alone and their own rookie streak was terminated by the Lightning Team a full month or two before the tournament," the aging tactician stated.   
  
"Apparently they did if you go by the account that their team`s owner gave to the press after it happened," Canon retorted. "It doesn`t matter either way," Verity cut in, stepping into the cockpit and handing Solomon a cup of coffee before settling down into the co-pilot`s seat and taking over. "If most of the Class S veterans go down to the kind of tactics we`ve been employing in the past, this will be an easy win regardless," she affirmed, guiding the Hammerhead towards the ground a few seconds later.   
  
"Speakings of tactics," Victor began while entering the cockpit, placing a peck on his wife`s cheek and then swiping the last remaining seat, behind Solomon and across from Canon. "What`s King Senile thought up for us today?" He asked. "Bow and Liger," Solomon replied snappily, annoyedly glaring at his employee. "Bow and Liger? So that means all four of us then?" Canon asked. "Bit overkill this morning, huh?" Verity quipped as the Hammerhead II slipped onto the edge of what would be the battlefield, touching down softly with a number of loud gasps as the compressing shock absorbers in it`s landing 'legs' did their job and allowed the large Zoid to set down.   
  
"Overkill is probably the only chance we`ve got if you fools keep underestimating your opponents," Solomon grumbled, crossing his arms over his chest and turning his nose up.   
  
"Not our fault our opponents so far have been weaker Class S warriors," Canon retorted. "Actually it is, or are you forgetting that you guys pick who you challenge?" Solomon asked snidely. "... That isn`t the point here," Canon grumbled.   
  
"Sure it`s not. Go get ready for the match, it`s happening in thirty minutes so you don`t have much time," Solomon ordered, getting to his feet and stretching out the cramps from his aging frame.   
  
  
"Mobilizing Liger Zero Schneider..." Sounded into the cockpit as Bit uncrossed his arms from over his chest and took a moment to tug his gloves into place a bit tighter, grabbing the controls another second after that. The roar of the magnetic railing of the launcher system filled his ears a few seconds later. Adrenaline was flowing, his heart was pumping and his reflexes were at their usual height while the Liger bent forward and then blasted off of the launch system with a roar, touching down onto the ground an instant later with a skidding shriek of dirt and rock under the weight and speed of the large Zoid`s movements.   
  
It had been ten minutes since they arrived on the battlefield eleven minutes early. The other team had been waiting for them, that seemed to be a running tradition these days, but Bit didn`t mind it. Just meant they were either anxious enough to exhaust themselves with waiting or patient enough to want to get a glimpse of the Liger and the Fox as he and Brad launched.   
  
Another shriek, this one through the air as a far lighter quartet of thuds and skids sounded through Bit`s ears. Brad had just launched alright, and the golden form of the Scout Fox came to a dead stop next to the Liger with a shake of it`s head. "Ready?" Bit asked. "Yeah... Fox is feeling kinda smug actually," Brad replied with a smirk, tensing the Zoid a bit and waiting for the Judge to arrive. "How so?" Bit asked.   
  
"He`s the only Zoid on the battlefield that isn`t a Liger."   
  
"Good excuse," Bit commented, earning a growl from the Zero. "Can it, we`ll take their numbers down soon enough," Bit soothed over the Zoid`s annoyances. "Just as soon as the damned Judge Ca-" The rest of Brad`s sentence was promptly annihilated by the roar of a super sonic impact from low orbit, throwing up a visible pillar of superheated dust and smoke from the crash landing.   
  
"... Punctual, aren`t they?" Brad asked sourly to Bit`s amusement.   
  
** "The area within a five mile radius is a designated Zoid Battlefield. This zone is now restricted. Only competitors and personnel have authorized entry. All others must leave the area at once. Area scanned. Battlefield set up. The Blitz Team versus the Schlag Team. Battle Mode 0982. Ready..." **  
  
"Hey Brad," Bit began quickly as the Judge paused. "Bet I can come through this with less damage than you," he challenged. "I don`t gamble any more," Brad replied sourly.   
  
** "_FIGHT!_"   
  
** "One of them is missing," Brad observed as the Fox and the Zero started to run forward alongside each other. "From line of sight anyway," he amended an instant later. "I noticed," Bit replied as the Schlag Team started at them, firing off a hail of machine gun rounds at the two solitary Zoids of the Blitz Team, which artfully dodged through with only minor damage. "Guess they can`t aim, huh?" Bit asked with amusement at the fact that the Schlag Team didn`t try to follow them with their guns.   
  
"Wrong guys," Jamie cut in from the Hover Cargo. He was the only member of the Blitz Team aside from Bit and Brad present for the battle. "Take a look at how far apart these guys are spread," he ordered. Right then, Bit and Brad both felt like smacking themselves and promptly started opening fire, trying to get one of the enemies to back out of formation. The plan failed.   
  
And then the Simulacrum Blade Ligers all switched their blades out, slinging the weapons to their sides and boosting forward at the two Blitz Team Zoids, leaving Bit and Brad both more than a little uncomfortable. "Grand," Brad muttered sourly, backpedalling the Scout Fox as quickly as the small Zoid could manage, followed by the Schneider, which had a far better time of it since it had forward facing thrusters by default. "They`re gonna try and push you off the battlefield or dice you and those Ligers can all make pretty good turns so they`ll be able to chase you for a long time," Jamie explained, keeping his cool at an impossible time.   
  
"Any ideas then, whizz kid?" Bit and Brad demanded. "For one, stop saying the same thing at the same time, for two, split up!" Jamie ordered. "Alright, ready Brad?" Bit asked. "As I`ll ever be," the former mercenary replied as the remainder of the Blitz Team continued running backwards through the two empty spaces between rigid lines of fire. "I`ll go left, you go right and be ready to try and dodge those blades..."   
  
"Just shut up and get moving," Brad ordered, lunging the Scout Fox over of the Simulacrum`s twin streams of fire, narrowly dodging by inches while the Schneider corkscrewed sideways over another, with both Zoids jumping again in near perfect timing to try and dodge over the blades of the soon-to-pass Blade Ligers.   
  
Neither was very expectant of the missiles both caught a few seconds later, blowing their Zoids out of the air and having the added effect of flinging them back down into the ground hard while the normal Shield Liger trailed after the three false Blade Ligers, leaving Bit and Brad to land hard on the ground behind the team, which executed an oddly graceful turn-around, with the three Blade Ligers skidding around on their forepaws while the Shield Liger jumped and corkscrewed into a flip over them, landing at the exact distance behind them as it had been at the start of the match.   
  
"Well, that could`ve gone better," Jamie mumbled as Brad and Bit brought their Zoids back up. "Any genius ideas left now?" Brad asked. "Just try and split them up, both of your Zoids have a speed trump card and Bit has the added bonus of being more agile... With any luck they`ll split in two and one of you can try and take that Shield Liger out," Jamie muttered. "Not your best strategy," Bit commented. "But it`ll have to do," Brad replied. "Sadly," Bit grumbled. "How much ammo do those head guns of their`s have?"   
  
"Ammo-count wasn`t listed in the public data the ZBC let me access," Jamie replied dryly. "Lovely," Bit muttered as the Schneider and the Scout Fox both annoyedly turned tail and started running from the attacking Schlag Team.   
  
"Is this all the Blitz Team can do?" Canon asked over the broadband, trying to chip away at the other team`s confidence. "Not quite," Brad replied, swinging the Scout Fox around and darting it underneath another dual stream of firepower, while Bit sped off into the opposite direction.   
"Here`s hoping this works," Jamie commented.   
  
And then the Shield Liger went flying over the other Schlag Team Ligers, shield activating in a flurry of pinkish-tinted energy while the Zoid blasted into a twist, shield-ramming the Scout Fox right off of it`s feet and sending the smaller Zoid tumbling along at high speeds that would likely rip most Zoids apart.   
  
"... Crap," Jamie muttered annoyedly. "Now you know why it`s called the Bow and Liger tactic," an aged voice stated over the broadband as the three false Blade Ligers continued chasing after Bit and the Schneider, leaving Brad and the Scout Fox to limply stand back up again, staring down the Shield Liger at near point blank range. "And now you know why you`re about to lose," Verity cut in, dropping her shield and opening fire on the Scout Fox only to watch the nimble little Zoid dodge out of the way and vanish before her eyes.   
  
"Say`s your mom," Brad chided, just as a hail of plasma rained in on the Shield Liger`s side, throwing the Zoid off of it`s feet in the process while Bit finally jumped the Schneider up and over the three false Blade Ligers, boosting back down and deploying the side blades with brutal precision.   
  
"I think that means you guys just got Blitzed," he stated cheerfully. "We don`t need a catchphrase Bit, just keep trying to take them down," Jamie cut in as the Schneider`s side blades slashed into the hind legs of two of the false Blade Ligers, grazing through armor and then swiping forward in a manner that sliced off two of their blades and two of their front legs in the process, manuevering into a jump as the two Zoids smacked into each other head first in their fall, then skidding along sideways while the remaining Simulacrum dodged away from it`s fallen comrades and swung around, opening fire with it`s Double Impact Cannon.   
  
"Canon and Ambrose may be down, but not me," Victor stated as the Schneider rocked back from the impacts across it`s face, only to swing it`s five head-blades forward with a metallic sheen, each blade beginning to glow brightly. "Not yet anyway," Bit replied as the Zero charged forward.   
  
Brad grunted as the Shield Liger opened up again. It`s pilot might have been panicking but she might also have just realized that she was only going to hit him on luck at the rate she was going, but either way, she was royally tearing at the Scout Fox by literally coating the area around herself with all of her missiles and cannon rounds, even swinging the Shield Liger`s hidden beam cannon up into place and using that to try and further the damage she might inflict by chance. At this point, none of the shots had hit him yet but with all of the close calls he was getting, he was genuinely starting to get more than a little annoyed and a little worried that she might fluke a hit on him.   
  
"Come on out!" Verity demanded as the Liger swung it`s weapons back into their hiding places, suddenly lunging at Brad as the Scout Fox passed through a cloud of smoke and came back out, disturbing the layer of thick black smoke in just such a way that it left the outline of the small Zoid visible for an instant. He was ready though, and Verity found out the hard way that it paid to keep the shield up when trying to attack at point blank with a Shield Liger, meeting a hail of plasma into the space of her Zoid`s chest cavity while the Fox darted under her, pausing in it`s run just long enough to swing open it`s tail and catch her again as she landed.   
  
The Shield Liger shuddered and Brad whipped around, dropping his cloak and jumping the Scout Fox over the Schlag`s Liger, kicking it in the rear again with the Fox`s hind legs and springing back up into the air a good distance as a result while Verity was left to curse to herself. This wasn`t the kind of battle she had been hoping for _at all_.   
  
Bit on the other hand was having a bit of trouble of his own. Despite the fact that the Schneider easily overpowered, outmanuevered and outpaced the remaining Simulacrum, it`s pilot had just enough skill to dodge out of the way of each attack and try to get in a hit of his own. The two hadn`t landed a single shot on each other with blades yet but Zero had a plan and Bit was willing to go along with it.   
  
"This has been fun and all, but I think it`s time to quit playing around," Victor stated as the Simulacrum charged forward, firing off it`s cannons at the Schneider, which merely jumped back a bit more each time, swinging it`s jet boosters back up onto it`s back while disengaging the main blades, allowing the Simulacrum to get a little closer with each second. "That makes three of us," Bit replied as a few rounds finally hit home, taking a sizable chunk out of the Schneider`s crests while the Zoid only growled in agreement with him.   
  
An instant passed and the Schneider jumped upward as the Simulacrum crossed the remaining distance and swerved to the side to try and gut the other Liger on it`s right blade, only to find that the Liger Zero had all but used it`s own attack against it, firing off the thruster in the remaining crest, as well as the two jet boosters to swing itself to the left in a downward spiral, stabbing roughly into the Simulacrum`s forward half while twisting, gutting through the other Zoid and tearing noticable chunks out of it before landing on all fours perfectly, never having used any of it`s full attacks.   
"Shit!" Victor yelled as the Simulacrum tumbled along hard, slamming into the ground on it`s side while a circular portion of it`s insides landed into a trail along after it, smoking badly as a result of the damage the Schneider had just caused. "Told you we were gonna quit playin` around," Bit smirked. "We didn`t exactly get into Class S because we rely on luck only yanno," he informed as another explosion sounded through the battlefield.   
  
The Shield Liger roared defiantly in mid-air while the Scout Fox twisted sideways under it, hooking it`s claws into the throat of the larger Zoid and almost slinging it to the ground on it`s back in a Judo-sort of way before drawing back again and stabbing into the same gap it had just used, severing a good many of the vital controls of the Shield Liger, just as Verity let out a bemused utterance or three of every cuss word in the book.   
  
** "Battle over! Battle over! The winner is... The Blitz Team!"** The Judge exclaimed, motioning towards the Blitz Team with it`s blue hand while Jamie sighed in relief over the broadband. "So I was right," Solomon commented, virtually unphased by his team`s fresh loss. "The Blitz Team doesn`t rely on coordinated strategy," he mused. "Actually we do," Jamie replied, rubbing the bridge of his nose. "They just never follow the plan exactly," he replied annoyedly. "I know how that goes," Solomon replied, a faint Germanic accent finally shining through in his voice. "Tell me about it," Jamie muttered.   
  
"Looks like they did pretty good without you," Steve commented, settling the tray onto his daughter`s lap and helping sit the bed up. "Yeah," Leena replied, none-too-enthused about it all. "They sure _did_ do better without me, didn`t they?" She asked before beginning to eat. Doctor Tauros may have caught that glint in her eye as she said the words, but if he did, he didn`t say anything. She was probably just tired, right?   
  
Probably.   
  


_ End Chapter Nine  
  


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_

**Author`s Note:** Yay! They won! Sorry this one was shorter than the last few but I`m still gettin` my Zoids groove back on so... May be a few chapters before I churn out lengthier chapters. It`ll also probably be a week or so before I post again but I`ll do my best to try and get back into the swing of things.  
  
**Shiro:** Since I keep screwing up your full name, I`m just stickin` with callin` ya Shiro. Hope ya don`t mind x_x;  
  
And on a parting note: The names of the Schlag Team members come from the storyline of the Earthsiege/Starsiege computer games, jumbled up a bit for variety. Harabec`s first name also comes from there but that`s about it :P  
  
And if you`re curious, Schlag means Shock or Shocker in German, whichever. Blitz means Lightning in German so Blitz Schlag = Lightning Shock. Behold my cheesy pun abilities...  
  
Sh33p out folks, see ya next time! 


	11. Consequences Unseen

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I do not own Zoids, but I do own the OCs in this story for the most part.  
  


* * *

  
  


** New Age**  
Consequences Unseen  
  
  
  


"What was that?" Vega asked himself, leaning up in bed and taking a moment to pause and take his surroundings back in. The details of the room sent him sliding fervently back under the covers, dragging the pillow along with him and staying hidden for several seconds at the sound of an oddly familiar blasting alarm in the distance, something that made him curl up into a ball on instinct and try to compress his body mass beneath the covers. _ "... Can`t be,"_ he thought, regarding the sound of the alarm fading into the distance followed by tire screeches and a distinct crashing sound, but no explosion. At this, Vega calmed and strightened up in bed, his pajama pants making a few ruffling sounds with the sheets while the pillow was shoved back into place.   
  
In a show of stealth, the boy slipped out of the bed through the side, falling haphazardly onto the floor since he didn`t want to be seen, then scooting underneath the bed.   
  
At least that was the plan, Vega didn`t count on his own body growth and wound up half stuck for several seconds before prying himself loose and sitting up on the floor with a slightly terrified glance. He was alone. The room was as clean as ever, to the extent that it literally lacked any sort of built-in smells that he could detect, and it also had windows.   
  
The layout was the same though, all that was changed was the lack of the Backdraft Group`s crest directly in front of the bed, where a TV on a dresser had taken over. There was also a more convincing change too, one that virtually sealed the deal on this not being the old prison cell-styled-like-a-hospital room.   
  
The windows were glass. And they didn`t have bars on both sides. Vega breathed a sigh of relief, plopping down uneasily onto the bed and staring the floor with a visible lack of worry. Everything seemed to be fine, his ears weren`t sore, his sight was clear, he didn`t feel any pain from where he should`ve had a black eye and...   
  
There was something else that just felt so different about it all. He couldn`t quite put his finger on it but he felt there was something unbelievably different about the place. Like he had been there before, somehow, but at the same time, hadn`t ever been there at all.   
  
_ "I guess I`m just feeling the after effects of having my ears almost blown out,"_ Vega thought, standing up straight and stretching out for several seconds before walking onward to the window and staring out of it.   
  
That was when the door ripped open, the sound of an angry dart being fired and the feeling of something small and sharp jabbing into the skin of his left shoulder. With a small wince, Vega turned around to find himself staring at a piece of history. Two, in fact.   
  
"Come on Kale, it`s time to come home," Sarah said sternly, a younger, quieter Vega Obscura standing in front of her as a pair of gaurds entered the room and...   
  
  
And Vega woke up with a snap of movement, instinctively almost flying out of the bed in a blur to attack whatever was closest to him, finding his fist reflexively blocked in a boxer-styled movement by whoever had been standing at the foot of the bed, but even then, the full weight of a ninety pound child moving at the speed of an Olympic athlete was enough to knock anyone back several steps, and as Vega toppled off the edge of the bed with a dull thud, only to spring back up ferally, another voice cut into things, rumbling, gruff and deep all at once.   
  
"I warned you not to stand at the edge of the bed when he`s asleep," it warned as Vega snapped his gaze back, glaring briefly before softening up and letting out a sigh at the sight of Stigma Stoller, arms crossed lazily over his chest, one leg resting over the other at the ankle and the knee, his usual neutral expression being worn as it almost always was. "Oh," Vega said finally in understanding, resisting the urge to shield his still-bruised eye with his elbow.   
  
"Jeez," Bit grumbled, lowering out of his defensive posture and dusting himself off with an annoyed look. "You hit harder than most of the supposed 'athletes' back in High School," he added with the same tone. Vega sheepishly chuckled and almost robotically sat back down on the edge of the bed, staring over towards the window without another word.   
  
"I think I should check out today," he stated. "You already are, 3:00 PM today," Stigma said in his usual tone. "How much longer is that?" Vega asked. "Five hours," Stigma answered. "... Oh... Okay," Vega shrugged, glancing over at Bit as he made his way towards the door. "Tell Leena I said to get well soon," he asked, even though he`d probably said it a dozen times already. "Alright, I`ll see ya later," Bit replied with a half-hearted wave, exiting the room and shutting the door behind him.   
  
_ "That was weird,"_ the Royal Cup champion thought worriedly, tucking his hands into his shirt`s front pockets and walking onward, headed for the room Leena was presently assigned to.   
  
"Stig," Vega began, trying to pick his words out. "Did Sarah come by yesterday?" He asked. "Yes," the former warrior who had adopted him replied. "And?" Vega asked again. "I left before she could say anything that I`d remember," Stigma replied dryly, leaning back into the chair a bit further. "Gee, thanks," the boy grumbled sarcastically. "Is the Fury doing okay?" He asked. "It won`t let me do anything but lead it the shop and let the repairs begin working, nothng else."   
  
"Good enough," Vega commented, ignoring the tone of the old veteran and standing back up to look for his normal clothing. "In the bathroom, wating for you," Stigma replied to the unspoken question, getting up. "I`ll be in the lobby waiting for you since you`re in such a rush, then we can do the paperwork and check you out early," Stigma explained in his usual tone, walking around the bed and heading for the door while Vega moped his way tiredly into the bathroom.   
  
  
"Where`s Jamie?" Was the first question voiced by Bit as he returned, carrying along a cup of coffee in the process. "Off on a date," came the robotically instinctive reply from both Brad and Leena, though the former mercenary was busy enjoying his usual morning cup of tea. Like a weirdo. Of course, nobody had in the room thought it that out of place that anyone would be drinking piping hot tea when the rest of the room`s occupancy had a few odd tendancies of their own to deal with, like the Doc`s infatuation with his model Zoids or Leena`s enjoyment of giving Bit a concussion whenever he stole he cookies, or the fact that Bit still did it despite the five foot thick stack of medical bills he`d paid off over the past months because of it...   
  
In short, tea drinking was so mundane that nobody noticed it, even though a scruffy headed, tough guy mercenary was doing it. "... Jamie got a date?" Bit asked after several seconds. "He said it was 'just lunch with a new friend,' but in Jamie-speak that means '**_HOT DAMN, I`VE HIT THE MOTHA LOAD!_**'" Brad shouted, breaking his normal reserve to speak in an oddly Southern accent for several seconds, drawing stares and raised eyebrows from everyone else in the room.   
  
"It was with that Leyla girl you guys were teasing him about," Steve commented, inching back a bit from Brad, despite still having posted himself up in the chair next to his daughter`s bed. "Oh yeah," Bit replied dumbly, setting the coffee onto the table and sitting himself down lazily. "Forgot about that..."   
  
"You forget about a lot of things, Bit. Nobody cares," Brad reminded dryly. "Better to forget then spend a week obsessing over it like you," Bit grumbled back. "Observe, yes. I observed as Jamie psyched himself out, I observed as he spent an hour trying to pick out a decent pair of shorts and I observed the fact that you`re a blonde twit," Brad replied quietly, setting his tea onto the table. "But obsessed? No, just an innocent bystander," the former mercenary added with a slight yawn.   
  
"... Right... Anyway," Bit shifted. "Vega said to get well soon... Again," he offered over to Leena, who was utterly unphased. "I think that kid`s developing a crush on me..."   
  
"If not for the fact that he tried to kill the lot of us, I`d almost think it was cute," Brad commented, idly flipping open a newspaper. "... Wow, Brad`s expanding his vocabulary, shocking," Bit chided. "Least I have a vocabulary," Brad retorted. "Tea drinker," Bit mocked. "Coffee chugger," Brad shot back. "Toast nibbler," Bit fired off. "Bagel muncher," Brad sharply let out.   
  
"... That is _so_ wrong on _so_ many levels..."   
  
"The truth always is. Deal with it."   
  
  
_ "She isn`t here, let`s go home."   
  
"No, **you** said you`d meet her here!"   
  
"... Damn it, I don`t wanna blush to death!"   
  
"Too bad!"   
  
"Shut up!"_ Jamie growled in thought at his alter ego, still leaning idly against the wall next to the door in his usual clothing, though this was a set he had cleaned so thoroughly that it actually sparkled if viewed in the proper lighting. _"Uhm... Five minutes?"   
  
"We just got here."   
  
"... I hate you,"_ Jamie thought, again aiming for his alter ego in the process and again nailing it on the head. _"Glad to see the feeling`s still mutual, ol` buddy, ol` pal!"_ The Wild Eagle replied pleasantly, projecting the mental image of his own physical persona-like thought avatar giving Jamie`s a noogie. Coincidentally, it was around that time that Jamie felt something roughly grind into his scalp and turned around.   
  
Nothing was there but the wall.   
  
With a sigh of frustration, Jamie tucked his hands into his pockets and ignored the people coming in, looking for a particular head of blue hair. "I hate waiting," Jamie grumbled. _"You spend most of the battles we have waiting for your strategy to pay off and enjoy it,"_ the Wild Eagle replied. _"Because lengthy strategy is the only thing I own you in,"_ Jamie grumbled. _"And as you keep getting better at piloting, that`ll change too... Wonder how long it`ll be?"   
  
"Eh?"   
  
"Nothing."   
  
"Tell me."   
  
"... Nah..."   
  
"**Tell me**."   
  
"Eat me,"_ the Wild Eagle replied, just as a chain of events wound up with Jamie holding his nose sorely with an annoyed grumble or three. It had started when Jamie stood up straight from leaning on the wall, then taken several steps forward, intent on reaching the bench placed at the other side of the row of entrances, and then it had continued when one of the door was rapidly swung open at random, and it ended with said-door smacking Jamie in the face. It wasn`t bad enough to bleed or anything, but Jamie would probably have a small bruise later on.   
  
Not that had minded of course. It _had_ been an accident, right?   
  
"Get back here!" A familiar voice shouted as a very unfamiliar little boy looking about half of Vega`s age darted through, cackling loudly before doubling around and heading to try and hide behind Jamie, though the teen merely sidestepped out of the way as the door swung back open, narrowly avoiding the door smacking into his face again, though the boy let out a yelp and a shout, finding himself rapidly flung up into the air and caught with a slightly painful sounding grunt as his stomach impacted a large shoulder.   
  
A few seconds went by as a _very_ broadshouldered man looking about Steven`s age lumbered through the door, followed by a girl about Jamie`s age, a girl he recognized instantly and a girl who looked little, if anything like either of two people she was apparently coming in with.   
  
"Leyla?" Jamie asked, head cocked curiously to the side. "Something wrong?" The girl asked, wearing the same kind of outfit as she had been when they`d first met. "No, just kinda had a long day," Jamie lied, sheepishly rubbing the back of his head, all the while thinking the same thought as his alter ego at the sight of the large man who was leering at him like he was her father...   
  
_ "Please don`t kill me..."   
  
_  
Harabec grimaced to himself, again slamming the door shut for the umpteenth time in the face of a reporter. They`d been all but harrassing him for almost a week and a half now, almost driving _down_ business rather than helping it. "Go get the story from the Blitz Team!" He yelled through the glass, shooing away the reporter and slinging the curtain on the door shut.   
  
"Jesus... Now I remember why I wore the god damned mask and went by an alias," he muttered annoyedly, turning around and going back to the counter. He hadn`t opened yet of course, he usually opened at around one in the afternoon and it was only eleven or so now, meaning he was still basically alone in the place for a little while longer before his employees started coming in.   
  
"You really should`ve told me," a voice asked, and Harabec lazily turned around to spot a familiar young man leaning back against the bar with a smirk that made something in the old veteran want to scream. "And you really should call us more often," he stated. "You have any idea how many times your parents`ve called me tryin` to bleed your whereabouts outta me? Or what about Abbie?" He asked annoyedly. "Sorry," Marcus excused with a shrug.   
  
"But you should`ve told me you were a former Zoid pilot - let alone the guy who had Class S by the balls for four years straight... Seriously, I cou-" "No, you couldn`t have used me as a teacher. I`m a lousy instructor, just ask that guy I trashed the other day," Harabec reprimanded sharply. "Yeah well... Why keep something like _**that**_ from your own family?" Mark asked dryly. "Your mom and dad already knew, so did a few others," Harabec answered in the same time, yanking a few chairs off of the tables he`d set them on and placing them upright on the ground. "What`d you do with all the money anyway?" Mark asked curiously. Given his age and the fact that he was battling mainly to help pay for Abbie`s college education, money was never far from his mind anymore.   
  
"I gave most of it to charity and used what was left to open my bar `n` grill," Harabec shrugged. "... Never figured you for the charitable type, Uncle Beck," Marcus chided, hopping down. "And I never figured you to be the type to have the balls and the lack o` common sense to be a Zoid warrior, guess that makes us even?" Harabec retorted.   
  
"Eh? Thought you`d be happy..."   
  
"I am. Happy that you aren`t dead," Harabec replied sharply. "I`m also not too happy about how you got the Zoid," he added with annoyance, repeating the process of taking chairs off of their tables and setting them upright in the process. "I won it fair and square..."   
  
"By tricking a guy into a card game," the veteran snorted. "He challenged me!" Mark defended. "... You _never_ lose games of chance and you have the indecency to accept a challenge from some poor sap like that? Come on Mark, I ain`t that dumb," Harabec growled, referencing his nephew`s unbreakable streak of luck through the years. "... Not my fault I`m lucky," Mark grumbled defensively. "Lucky ya aren`t dead," Harabec shot back. "A Royal Cup _champion_, Marcus. You fought a guy like Bit Cloud and got to a draw because you`re _lucky_," Harabec chastised, walking around the counter a second or so later.   
  
"... Fox would disagree," Marcus growled.   
  
"That`s `cause Fox is the reason ya won, dunce," Harabec replied. "That Zoid`s your luck now, but without him you ain`t crap," Harabec shot off. Marcus just stared at his uncle with a look of mixed anger and annoyance. "You`ve never even trained to pilot anything but a Gustav, kid, that Zoid`s correcting every mistake you make and it`s only putting up with you because you don`t treat it like you own it, but wait until someone it doesn`t have to correct every other move comes along," Harabec growled.   
  
"Yeah. Lovely. Just give these to Abbie and tell her I said 'hi' and 'I love you,' later," Marcus ordered glaringly, slamming down three checks and storming towards the side exit without so much as a single good-bye.   
  
Harabec shook his head and went back to getting ready for opening shop up again, not saying or thinking a single word, just wearing a soured expression and possessing an equally soured state of mind.   
  
There was a jingle at the door and Harabec looked up, first in annoyance, then in surprise as a fellow veteran-and-retiree from the world of Zoid battling stepped inside, a little shorter and a little rounder than Harabec himself but still easily recognizable even after ten years.   
  
"I always wondered what you`d look like without the mask on," Oscar Hameros stated at the man he had knocked off for the Class S championship a decade before, only to crash a few minutes after his victory from battle damage.   
  
  
Kale hopped down off of the nose of the Genosaurer, landing with a shock on both feet and looking up without a single expression at the healing Zoid above him. A thirteen foot high stack of looted, drained batteries of every size piled off at the edge of the crater as he waled over to the foot of the huge Zoid, ignoring the storm clouds gathering overhead and settling down onto it`s foot, even as rain began to trickle down from the skies above.   
"It`s almost time," he said to himself, a crash of thunder and a blinding flash of light sounding off in the distance. The Zoid rumbled agreeably, the damage to it`s enormous frame almost completely repaired by now.   
  
_ "Vega..."   
  
_ Another clashing impact of thunder and lightning, hitting somewhere out in the distance as the rain started coming down in buckets, the only saving grace for Kale`s meager belongs being that they were in the Geno`s cockpit.   
  
_ "I`m going to kill you."   
  
_ Another threatening impact, and the empty pile of batteries ignited into a fireball, clashing red with blue-white froma lightning bolt.   
  
_ "And it`s going to be soon."   
  
_ Rain poured, and the elder of the Brothers Obscura continued to sit, lost in his own murderous thoughts while the Genosaurer allowed itself to be consumed in the flow of hatred it recieved from him...   
  


_ End Chapter Ten  
  
_

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**Author`s Note:** So now you`re beginning to learn of the connections between all of the old timers in the story, from Harabec and Oscar to Leyon, Steven and Rina(Leena`s mother), and you`re also being treated to a bit of development on Kale and Vega. Did I mention you`re finally going to get to see a bit more into Leyla`s personality? Not too much, of course, but still.  
  
And I`d bet money none of you are gonna see what`s coming when I`m through with them *Snicker.*  
  
**Shiro:** I don`t actually know German but given how a few of my friends are rabid about the fact that they have a bit of German blood in them, and how the shows had a few things I personally identify with Germany(Imperial uniforms(for some reason), certain Zoid names(the Saurers, Fuhrer, Liger(it sounds German to me for some reason...), Blitz, etc), not to mention a few future twists, it only seemed prudent to have at least one other team named in German. And yes, I do decrease the chances of screwing your name up now... I dunno why but I just can`t spell your full name correctly more than twice in a row :P  
  
**Zinou:** *Snark* Understood about why ya haven`t been reviewing as much as you would otherwise, it happens, eh? And yeah, it would seem that way. Maybe that was why Jack and the Taskers proved to be the only opponents who actually beat the Blitz Team officially, to kick off a fued between the ways to say lightning? I dunno, seems kinda symbolic for some reason.  
  
Odd point about the instrumentals, I`ve been listening to everything from Linkin Park to dubbed DBZ songs for my inspiration o_O None of it tops a good, intense round of orchestrated music though, been using Carl Orff - O Fortuna a good bit. If ya want, I`ll post up all the songs I use :P  
  
And sorry about the run-ons, blame the fact I used to be a major RPer, in that sort of environment, longer-than-hell sentences are the norm when dealing with anyone who was a real description freak. And yes, I agree about the OCs, I hate how most OCs tend to be made solely to hook up with main characters or take over the story from them entirely, and I especially **hate** how they usually have some unendingly tragic background. You`d be surprised at how I had to change a few OCs from the original versions to fit them in without them be angsty puddles of goo or uberly rich, benevolent good guys with full-fledged bases and multiple Zoids(NA Kyle for example, his only similarities to the original version of him my friend thought up are almost the only reason I didn`t rename him entirely, he even looks a little different).  
  
Another thing I absolutely despise is how so many villains(in fan fiction **and** in so many anime series) are so sympathetic once you learn about them. I know I`m probably going to wind up doing a bit of that to Kale if I haven`t already, but jesus... I hate when people make excuses up for their characters to be evil. The chief villain of the story for example, I changed him so much his only real similarities to his original version are in name and Organoid.   
  
So the OCs in this story are generally going to just be co-stars with a few shining moments while I figure out how to better write down the Blitz Team, and the story itself may very well lack a true main character but so far it seems like Vega, Jamie or Bit will take that role over.  
  
Hope you guys liked all the stuff that happened in this one, in particular, the bit about Harabec cutting down Mark about his draw with Bit. It had to be addressed more openly at some point since Forte`s review got me thinking about just how Mark could have pulled it off.  
  
**Aardwulf**, **ZeonReborn** and **Sick Little Fiend:** Come on guys, where`d ya go? :P  
  
Enough rambling from me now, Sh33p out! Enjoy, leave a review and see ya next time! 


	12. Of Wild Eagles, Old Rivals and First Dat...

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I don`t own Zoids.  
  


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**New Age**  
Of Wild Eagles, Old Rivals And First Dates   
  
  
  


In life, there seemed to be a code of survival amongst people like Jamie Hameros, a code of survival which could be quite useful given most conditions. It came down to a select set of rules:   
  
1) Do not be noticed.   
  
2) If noticed, shift attention to someone else. Unless it`s being noticed for strategy.   
  
3) Try to maintain maximum distance from the opposite sex.  
    Supplimental: Try to maintain maximum distance from the same sex as well.   
  
4) Avoid dating.   
  
5) If shnookered into a date, try to act as unattractive as possible while maintaining manners, simply try to be boring.   
  
6) If the girl`s dad is 6'5", features three or more grizzly looking scars, a wild glint in at least one eye and a half-a-foot long beard, tuck your head between your legs and kiss your ass good-bye.   
  
These rules were adhered to quite strictly by the teenaged son of Oscar Hameros, especially since he had successfully survived to the ripe old age of 15 and a half years old through them, but now it seemed he had failed on rules 3 through 6.   
  
Because of that, he was now standing in front of an extremely cheerful Leyla - that at least made the likelihood of dying seem relatively pleasant, along with an overly energized little boy flailing around on the shoulder of a man that Jamie easily pegged as her father, who happened to be a good three inches over the height floor for rule number six, had four fairly pronounced scares across the right side of his face and a wildly studious glint in both eyes, not to mention a graying, half-a-foot long beard.   
  
The worst downside to this was that Jamie wasn`t flexible enough to bend over, tuck his head between his legs and kiss his own ass good-bye. The Wild Eagle could probably do it on account of the 'opposites' rule that he and Jamie had, but that wasn`t a gaurantee either.   
  
And speaking of the Wild Eagle...   
  
_ "If he starts throwing punches, turn control over to me..."_ The secondary personality ordered rapidly. Jamie gulped and thought back his reply with speed. _"If he starts throwing punches, dive us out of the nearest window and run like Hell..."_ He ordered back. _"That was the plan to begin with."   
  
_ "Something wrong?" The man asked with a voice that practically rattled the teen to his core as a result. "Oh... Uhm... No, not really," Jamie replied uneasily. "Ready for lunch?" He asked almost robotically. "Sure! Oh, and say hi to my dad," Leyla replied happily, sidestepping out of the way even though it probably would`ve taken another step or two to get fully out of Jamie`s line of sight for the huge fellow.   
  
"Call me Paul," the man ordered, though Jamie could find little, if any trace of generosity in his voice. He simply nodded blankly. "Nice to meet you, Paul," he half-lied. It was nice only because there were so many nearby bystanders and a hospital wasn`t more than a few blocks away. "So you`re gonna be taking my daughter on a date," the large man mused, eyes narrowing in such a way that only Jamie could see it. "... Erm... I du-" "Of course he is! Come on, Jamie, we`ve got an arcade to hit!" Leyla intruded, grabbing the teen by his arm and virtually dragging him away under Paul`s murderous gaze.   
  
_ "We`re gonna have to start carrying a handgun if you agree to a second date..."   
  
"... A handgun? We`d need a rocket launcher to deal with that thing!"   
  
_ "Don`t mind him too much," Leyla advised once the two rounded a corner and got out of Paul`s watchful glare. "Kinda hard not to," Jamie gulped, standing up straight on his own and grimacing to himself. "He does that to all the boys I meet," Leyla shrugged. "... Uhm..."   
  
"Besides, he`s not too bad once you get to know him. Certainly has taken a liking to me over the years," Leyla stated, tucking her hands into her vest pockets and walking along with Jamie. "I thought you said he and the kid were-" "They are. I`m adopted," Leyla cut him off at the pass with the answer to the question he hadn`t even asked yet. "Oh. That explains the difference then," Jamie said, sheepishly covering his verbal screw-up a second later. "No offense but you look too good to come from the same gene pool as him," he grumbled complimentingly.   
  
_ "... Did you just compliment a girl on her looks?"_ The Wild Eagle asked in a stunned manner. _"... Yeah..."  
  
"Holy crap!"   
  
_ "Thanks... I think," Leyla replied with a quirked up eyebrow. "I don`t really look at people`s outsides though, that`s why I offered to go out to lunch with you," she shrugged. "Thats pretty nice," Jamie replied carefully, trying to pick his words out. "Really, I look at your skin and I see a loser, I look inside and I see a genius," Leyla tried to explain, though without much success. "... You don`t get out much, do you?" Jamie asked dryly. "Nope."   
  
"Same."   
  
  
"Never did figure out why you wore a mask like you did," Oscar stated, sipping on a glass of water and glancing across the counter at Harabec. "Simple, I wanted to fight but I didn`t want the glory cuttin` into my social life," the other veteran replied simply enough. "Never figured out why you dropped the handle of 'Wild Eagle' just before our match either," he added.   
  
"... Heh..." Oscar voiced. "Family curse, I guess you could say," he explained. "How so?" Harabec asked. "The first born male in the Hameros family has always been doomed to carry a second mind, and his first son carries it and his first son carries it and it goes on and on," Oscar began.   
  
"The curse is all because some psycho a few dozen generations ago envoked something on my ancestor, stating that his first son and every first son after him would be forced to fight an endless battle with a demon called the Wild Eagle. Sometimes we win, sometimes we lose, but every time the result is the same, one personality consumes the other and gains it`s talents but nothing else. I won my bout with the Wild Eagle in my last match before I fought you," Oscar stated.   
  
"So now your son`s stuck with it until he eats it or it eats him," Harabec finished understandingly.   
  
"Exactly. Thing that worries me is, Jamie`s Wild Eagle isn`t the same as mine was, it comes out both in and out of a Zoid cockpit, and it has no qualms about killing..."   
  
"Well, he`ll sort it out. He`s your kid, after all," Harabec replied jovially. "Yeah... One thing that bugs me though..." Oscar trailed off curiously. "And that is?" The grizzled veteran asked. "Just exactly what in the hell got you to come up with a costume like that?" Oscar asked. "Seriously, the whole loose fitting black bodysuit thing, the black-and-gold striped mask, the funky black vest with a gold Rev Raptor head emblazened on the back..."   
  
Harabec paused at the question. "... Well... Seemed like the right thing to do at the time."   
  
"You were high as a kite, weren`t you?" Oscar asked monotonously. "... It was _that_ obvious?" Harabec asked in the same tone.   
  
  
"I don`t know who you are, or why you`re here to see me, so be quick about it or leave. And if you`re a reporter, get the hell out now," Sarah ordered sternly, sitting across the table fromthe man who`d come to visit her. "My name is Doctor Steven Tauros, I can guess by now that you`ve probably heard of me and certainly heard of my team," the man responded casually. "Ah... Yes, I remember you from my trip to see Vega. How is he?" She asked. "He checked out of the hospital just as I was leaving to come see you. His hearing hasn`t fully recovered but the swelling around his eye is going down," Steven informed with a good bit of understanding in his voice.   
  
"Thank god for that much..." Sarah muttered. "I`m guessing you`re here to get information I have on Kale, right?" She asked.   
  
"That and to ask legal permission to rummage through the files of the Backdraft Group," Steve replied. "The internal network of the Backdraft collapsed, Doctor Tauros, I can`t help you there," she stated. "Actually you can... Given that the Group tried to steal my Zoids and all, I hacked them several times."   
  
"... I see. And Leyon didn`t notice?" She asked cynically. "No... I`m sure he noticed, whether or not he cared is the real question. The only files I couldn`t access after ripping off the entire network a few days prior to the Royal Cup tournament were those on the Five Kings project, the design specifications of the Genosaurers, Shadow Fox, Berserk Fury and something called the Blue Project..."   
  
"You`d have to consult Doctor Leyon on the Shadow Fox and the Blue Project, both were his brainchildren and he gaurded them zealously," Sarah replied. "Alright," Leyon nodded, getting out a small notepad and a pen. "Can you give me the access codes for the Five Kings and the Genosaurers?"   
  
"Why not the Fury too?" Sarah asked cynically. "Because it`d be completely illegal now that Vega has formally registered it," Tauros replied dryly. "But you`d love to take it apart, wouldn`t you?" Sarah asked with a knowing smirk. "Just like Leyon wanted..."   
  
"Leyon and I are two sides of the same coin, let`s leave it at that," Steve ordered. "Agreed," Sarah replied with a nod. "Can I have the codes now?" He asked.   
  
"5K-0310-PX-BDGP1A," Sarah began, letting Steven mark down each letter and number. "Alright, next?"   
  
"XRZ-14M-3V11-1337," Sarah continued, going just as slowly as before. "The first is to the Five Kings, it contains the personal data, video and audio of each subject, as well as a psychological profile for each one of them," Sarah stated calmly. "Want me to avoid Vega`s then?" Steven asked. "No," Sarah replied. "The second is to the Genosaurers, all the data you need that we could gather from them," she stated.   
  
"I see."   
  
"And now I`m guessing that you need to question me about my oldest son, Kale, correct?"   
  
"If it means my team could survive when they try to help Vega, yes," he answered. "Don`t bother Steve," Sarah ordered. "Kale is like a force of nature, if he wrecked them once he`ll finish the job at the next chance he gets. He won`t stop until his objective`s been met or he`s been killed, and Vega is the only one with the right potential to defeat him," Sarah said darkly. "You keep forgetting that Bit defeated Vega," Steve reminded.   
  
"Only because he had a lot of help. In a straight up fight, under any condition, Vega would beat Bit Cloud five times out of nine," Sarah stated. "... It`s not easy, is it?" Steven asked knowingly. "No. It`s not," Sarah sighed before looking up. "Are we finished now?" She asked.   
  
"For now, yes. I`ll call you if anything turns up and keep you posted on your sons," Steven explained, standing up and heading for the door.   
  
"Thank you," Sarah said as he knocked on the door, a gaurd stepping in an instant later. "Don`t mention it."   
  
  
"Leon Tauros, I presume?" A voice sounded from behind the back of the older Tauros sibling while he ate his lunch. "Yeah," he said after swallowing his food, turning around to see that he was faced with someone who he didn`t know, standing there without another word. The guy was Bit`s height, but a little thinner, with silvery hair that was cleancut, bar a set of bangs which framed a face that Leon guessed a good many women had likely gone ga-ga over at first sight. The guy was dressed in a pair of jean trowsers, a short sleeved, white t-shirt being worn beneath that with a pair of plain sneakers on his feet.   
  
"And you are?" Leon asked suspiciously, watching the youth`s light blue eyes narrow slightly in response. "Kyle Mazemia, owner of the Ivory Blade Liger," he stated in reply. "You`re only Class B," Leon pointed out, intelligently stopping the other from trying a challenge. At least he tried, anyway. "Doesn`t matter, I`m here to issue a challenge for you. Meet me in a battle, in one week. Your Liger against mine, deal?"   
  
"No deal," Leon shook his head. "I only do team battles now, and you`re a solo warrior only," he stated. "And if I said I could get a partner by the end of the week?" Kyle asked. "I still wouldn`t. You`re Class B, I`m Class A," Leon replied.   
  
"And if I could get myself and my partner into Class A by the end of the week?" Kyle asked. "Then you`re a miracle worker and a total lunatic," Leon answered dryly. "Would you accept then?" The silver headed youth asked once more. "Assuming Naomi agrees to it, sure," Leon answered after a bit of consideration.   
  
"Good. See you in a week," Kyle replied, walking off an instant later.   
  
  
"... How in the heck do you _do that_?" Jamie asked in shock as another Zoid in the VR arena went crashing down into a ball of fire, rolling along briefly to a stop before it`s pilot was disqualified. "Pretty natural really," Leyla answered, manuevering her virtual Command Wolf around in a liquidly swift motion to put her sights squarely onto Jamie`s virtual Pteras, though the other was just a bit too quick, bursting upward and dodging out of the way before Leyla even tried to fire a shot.   
  
"Not bad," she commented, only to pull the secondary triggers and send two smaller-sized shots into the air, which both shattered into clouds in the digital battle, right as a Shield Liger went driving through the air in a blur, slamming into the shots and emerged to find a third, high powered shot from Leyla`s long range rifle marking it squarely in the collar, cutting down into it`s virtual Zoid core and 'stoning' it instantly as a result.   
  
_ "She wasn`t aiming for us at all,"_ the Wild Eagle observed. _"I noticed,"_ Jamie growled, barrel rolling the Pteras towards the virtual battlefield`s ground and lowering it`s legs, grabbing a hold of the backside of a Rev Raptor and dragging it up into the air before going into a loop-de-loop and flinging it higher into the air, only to cut the engines of the Pteras in an instant and allow it`s own momentum to carry it up to point blank with the flailing Raptor, opening fire with a single missile before he reactivated the engines and harshly descended away from the ensuing explosion.   
  
"I think I`m getting better!" He stated happily. _"... In a simulator,"_ the other personality reminded sharply.   
  
An instant later, the simulator cockpit rattled around and Jamie swung hard into a loop, virtual bullets flying in from above in a rain that would have knocked him out of the game if not for reflexes he had slowly been cultivating over the course of several weeks. "Don`t count us non-warriors out just yet!" A civilian gamer yelled, only to promptly yell again as his Redler went crashing into the unreal battlegrounds in a fireball, a trio of rounds slamming into the thinly proportioned Zoid`s wing joints and bomb bay at the same time.   
  
"You need to learn to watch your back," Leyla commented, shimmying her virtual Irvine-styled Command Wolf into a number of trees and dropping yet another non-warrior with a single shot, rapidly moving again. "And you need to learn to look up," Jamie commented as the virtual forest exploded in flames, a Pteras and a Redler flying overhead of it a second later before crashing to the ground, one felled with a pair of weaker shots while a stronger round nailed the second.   
  
"You were saying?" Leyla quipped, her unharmed Command Wolf dashing up to a Molga under heavy fire and headbutting it onto it`s side before gutting it with one swift forepaw strike, firing off rockets backwards and her cannons forward in the same swift moment, downing two other Zoids as a result.   
  
"Remind me not to get you mad," Jamie muttered. _"Catering to a girl... Tsk, tsk, next thing ya know, you two`ll be at the altar..."   
  
"... Oh shut up."   
  
_ Mark grimaced.   
  
Again.   
  
It wasn`t because of the situation from earlier of course, it had more to do with the odd fact that for the past weeks, he had encountered more and more fairly sharpened objects pressed into his personal space than he`d rather there have been.   
  
Of course the first had been to the Shadow Fox`s throat, but that was a little different. This time, the blade was pressing gently across his own throat, broadside and possessing a similar curve to a Gurkhan Kukhri knife, but with a curved hilt more like a pistol than an actual handle, which, when combined with the angling of his would-be killer`s positioning and how the knife was being held, could all combine to remove Mister Harlock`s face.   
  
Along with the entire front third of his skull from the jawbone up.   
  
"Yanno... You bastards are _really_ starting to annoy me," he growled with audible distaste at the figure currently standing back to back with him in the awkward, potentially lethal pose the two were maintaining at the front door of a local flowershop. Mark had originally intended to go there to get some flowers for Abbie, his girlfriend, mainly since he hadn`t seen her in close to two weeks straight and had only talked to her four times in that duration.   
  
"Annoyance won`t matter if your head`s been removed," the man stated darkly, though both of them were obviously ignoring the onlookers in the street. "... Yes, no shit. Now, be a nice little mystery man and remove the knife threatening to permanently remove my razor sharp tongue so that you and I can engage in a mystique-filled chit-chat, ending with me somehow electricuting you with a fork, two pennies and a space heater."   
  
"... My, aren`t we just filled with confidence," the man stated, gently pressing the broadside of the longknife into Mark`s atom`s apple. "Let me take a guess..."   
  
"No."   
  
"Then what the hell do you want?"   
  
"I challenge you to a match, tomorrow afternoon, near sundown. If you don`t show, or if you decline, I`ll hunt you down and kill you. Is that clear?" He asked. "... Oh, how kind," Marcus sardonically spat, feeling the blade`s dull side pressing further into his throat as the sharpened edge began to just glightly knick the junction of his lower jaw and upper next. "... Fine," Marcus growled.   
  
The knife vanished from around his throat in a flash and in a whipping movement, he turned around, flinging a hand out and finding it blocked on the broadside of the weapon that had would`ve cleaved his head off moments before, currently pressed broadside against a darkly reddish colored sleeve, which lead to the shoulder-region of a turtleneck sweater of the same color, being sported by a man with black hair, though his face was obscured by a hockeymask of some kind.   
  
"Who are you?" Mark asked angrily. "Arihmanes," the man replied, holding Marcus` hand back for several seconds before whipping his own arm back, the pistoled hilt of the Khukri-styled knife allowing him to easily twirl it several times before sheathing it at his side.   
  
"I`ll see you," he stated before throwing a hand up, a line of some sort shooting out of his sleeve and stabbing into the ledging of a nearby building. "... Right," Mark growled, watching annoyedly as the man swung up off of the ground ala Spiderman, vanishing over the edge of the building`s roof in a bungee jump-like manner, promptly leaving the former Gustav trucker`s line of sight as a result.   
  
"Pompous ass," Mark growled. "I`ll make you eat that knife," he muttered through grit teeth, squeezing the batch of roses he had bundled in his hand so tightly that the sheath of paper around them split open, causing thorns to promptly jab him in the palm. He didn`t notice though.   
  
Marcus Harlock had the unique talent of totally ignoring his own pain. You could kick him in the groin with a steel toed boot and he would likely just stare at you until he could find a better time to scream his lungs out. It was this unique talent that meant he didn`t notice the trickle of blood coming from his hand, and he didn`t really care either way.   
  
That was because while Marcus Harlock could shut off his pain, he knew that it was unlikely this Arihmanes fellow could even try such a feat.   
  
And he was going to personally find out if the challenger came within arm`s reach of him again. But that could wait.   
  
There were more important things to do. Like look for a connection between the symbol on Arihmanes` sweater and that gang he had personally helped crash a few weeks earlier. Cracking his neck silently, the young man switched hands with the roses and wiped his bleeding hand off on his pants` leg, walking towards the parking lot he had left his Gustav and the Shadow Fox in when he`d arrived.   
  
It was time to put in a few calls and pull some strings that might not even exist, but he was going to try anyway.   
  


_ End Chapter Eleven  
  


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_

**Author`s Note:** To quote Kosh Naranek from Babylon 5: *Twinkle twinkle.* _And so... It begins..._ *Twinkle twinkle. Hovers off.*   
  
**ZeonReborn:** Argh... That sucks dude :\ Glad you like the story so far but it`s a shame you`re grounded :[  
  
That`s all for now, Sh33p out, enjoy, leave a review and see ya next time! 


	13. Preparations and the Stalker

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I don`t own Zoids.  
  


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**New Age  
** Preparations and the Stalker   
  
  
  


_"Can`t **anyone** issue a challenge to me without trying to kill me?"_ Marcus growled angrily in thought, rounding the corner to enter the parking lot and heading straight for the cockpit of the Gustav, heedless of the Fox`s low screeching rumbles of question. "Nothing," he grumbled at the Zoid, all but yanking the cockpit open and climbing inside without another word. If the Fox had any movable eyebrows, they`d`ve likely been quirked up in curiosity at it`s partner`s behavior.   
  
As it stood, Mark was swift in slamming the cockpit shut and promptly reprimanding himself over it.   
  
"Need a phonebook," he muttered to himself, trying to calm down while setting the roses, the stems a little redshifted in some blood, down onto the passenger`s seat, getting back up and crouching his way into the back of the Gustav`s cockpit to look around for one.   
  
Outside of the Zoid though, the Shadow Fox was still waiting for an answer for several seconds.   
  
Then it`s head tilted warily back, crimson eyes glowing as it caught a bit of movement up on the roof of a nearby building. It was slight, only vaguely noticable but still there. Seconds passed and the Fox shrieked a warning, loudly and proudly, over at the unseen intruder, watching and listening to a quick patter of human-sized feet, followed by a swift jump and a feathery light landing in the distance.   
  
The cockpit flew open and an annoyed Mark jumped out, storming around to glare daggers up at the Zoid.   
  
"What the hell was that about?!" He demanded. The Fox leered back down to him, motioning with it`s head towards the roof of the building the Gustav had parked next to. "Eh?" He asked, following the movement and seeing nothing out of the ordinary. The Fox growled something along the lines of a warning and rose it`s main gun out of forward-only firing mode, waiting patiently.   
  
"Right," Marcus muttered. "You just keep a watch and don`t blast anything unless it attacks," he ordered in a sigh, walking over to a nearby phone booth and reaching for his wallet in the process.   
  
Unfortunately -   
  
"**_THAT BASTARD!_**"   
  
- it had apparently been stolen. There was a plop along the ground next to him, followed by a quick skidding motion. Mark jumped back in reflex and glared down, only to find his wallet lying on the paved ground, freshly opened. "... What the hell kind of asshole am I dealing with here?" He growled angrily, swiping the wallet back off of the ground and checking through to make sure none of his cash had been stolen, the same for his driver`s license, Gustav registration card and the other things he kept in his wallet.   
  
He was more than a little mortified when he found that only two things were missing.   
  
The first was a picture. It wasn`t a very serious thing though, he kept two copies of it and could always just replace it, but it held more importance to find the picture was gone when he found the old stick-it note he`d crammed into his wallet just in case had also been stolen.   
  
That was because that stick-it note happened to have Abbie`s phone number, dorm room address and workplace listed. The picture was also one of Abbie giving a smile and a peace sign the night of High School graduation.   
  
"_Shit_," he growled to himself, turning back towards the Gustav and breaking into a sprint.   
  
  
"Where is he?" Vega asked as he and Stigma exited the hospital, the older of the two walking slower than normal for fear that he`d accidentally outpace the younger. "'He?'" Stigma asked, still walking alongside his younger counterpart. "Yeah. Fury," Vega answered. "Oh... _It_ is at a local shop for repairs and maintenance. Why?" The man asked as the two continued on down the sidewalk.   
  
"Because..." Vega paused in speech, trying to pick his words carefully. It had been a stressful number of weeks for the boy, and he wasn`t very clear in his thoughts at present. "Because?" Stigma asked quietly.   
  
"Because I need him to get into Class S."   
  
"Why is that?" Stigma asked again, pausing in his steps and holding a hand out in front of Vega just in case the boy didn`t see the light for walk-don`t walk switch over in favor of oncoming traffic. "Is it about the Blitz Team?" He asked.   
  
"No."   
  
"Kale isn`t a registered warrior," Stigma reminded. "I know," Vega replied, glancing around. "Then why?" The veteran asked again.   
  
"Because I need to get better so that I can stop him. I need to fight the kind of battles that Class S will give me and I need to do it soon. I _have_ to improve, Stigma," the former King of Unsanctioned Battles stated grimly. "I have to improve enough..."   
  
"To kill your brother," Stigma finished gravely. Vega gave a dark, numbed nod and the two continued onward, not another word said between them.   
  
  
A knock at the door. Abbie groaned to herself, she had been up all night and had only managed to get to sleep all of three hours earlier, when the party outside of her bedroom had finally died down and things went to their usual settled tone. It was a holiday of sorts, Independence Day in the Helic Republic, which was why she had the day off from her schoolwork, leaving her instead to focus on sleeping extra late and going in to work.   
  
If not for the knock at the door of the on-campus apartment she shared with two other girls.   
  
Neither of the others were awake of course, Hope was likely passed out with whatever overly muscled guy she had run into at last night`s party, likely in bed this time with any luck, while Jess was probably snoring on the kitchen floor, probably surrounded by beer bottles.   
  
That was one of the few things Abbie hated, she decided while putting her robe on after climbing out of bed, stumbling over to the door and opening it into the three-door hallway that lead from the living room to her room, Hope`s room and the bathroom. The door to Jess` room was next to the door to the hallway.   
  
_ "... I live with total pigs,"_ Abbie thought dryly, stepping over a small pile of empty bottles and then around a snoring Jess, who was camped out on the floor with her hands as pillows, lying next to one of the local guys she had become relatively attached to lately. The green haired college student didn`t even want to know what Hope`s situation was, just being glad that the other girl`s door was shut.   
  
Trash littered the floor, Abbie ignored it, rounding her way over to the entrance into her private little hellhole and opening the door hazily. "What?" She asked at the young man standing in front of her.   
  
"By any chance, do you know where Mark is?" He asked. Abbie didn`t recognize him, but given his appearance she was willing to bet she`d`ve tried to play herself off as if she did if it weren`t for her current relationship. Few things could even come close to making her look at another man the way she did Mark, mainly since the two had been together(sort of) since they were pre-teens.   
  
"All I know is that he needs to call more, why?" She asked groggily, wiping the sleep out of her eye. He nodded and smiled in a manner that she guessed would melt most women her age and then spoke up again a second later. "If you see him before I do, just tell him Kyle Mazemia has an offer for him," the man stated before tucking his hands into his trowser pockets. "... I`ll remember that. Bye," Abbie stated, dully shutting the door with a thud before slipping the locks into place and heading back towards her bedroom.   
  
And then another knock came from the door.   
  
Abbie groaned and glared at it, but didn`t move to answer it.   
  
Another knock.   
  
Abbie shrugged and walked towards her bedroom, intent on going back to sleep.   
  
The knock became a fisting smash.   
  
"**_GO AWAY!_**" Abbie screamed angrily at the door, though none in the dorm even stirred an inch.   
  
The knocking stopped. Abbie went back to her room, shut and locked the door and then returned to sleep.   
  
  
Arihmanes growled to himself silently, glaring daggers through the small glass dot in the door that let one see who was knocking, or who was answering. His growl softened though, at the sight before him, and the mask he wore rose slightly at the sight of the young woman sauntering - at least to him it looked that way - back to her room.   
  
Yes.   
  
She would be his. Soon enough.   
  
All he had to do was get rid of Harlock - as the mission required, then he would have her all too himself, whether she liked it or not. Turning back down the hall of the floor he was currently on, Arihmanes silently left, taking the opposite direction from the one that Mazemia had arrived and left in, his Khukriesque knife slapping lightly against his leg in the process.   
  
Rounding, down the steps without so much as a sound, Arihmanes made his way to the front door of the dormatory, ready to make another spectacular exit...   
  
If not for the blunted circle pressed into his temple. Beneath his mask, Arihmanes smiled.   
  
"You think you can play sick headgames with me?" Mark asked sternly, putting a bit more force into how he was holding the shotgun to his future opponent`s head. "Who said I was playing?" Arihmanes asked. "All the more reason to make smear out of your skull," Mark replied. "How quaint. The psychological profile of you is very fitting you know, I was almost in awe at how you helped Hameros destroy the Riven Facility... That was one of our chief suppliers too," he stated.   
  
"I don`t know what the hell you`re talking about and I could honestly care less," Mark growled. "Of course," Arihmanes replied in a low chuckle.   
  
There was a rapid swiping sound and three things happened in a blindingly fast instant, filled to the brink with a good deal of precise movement and very little sound to accompany it, ending with Arihmanes standing several paces to the right, with Marcus already re-leveling the shotgun on him in a blur.   
  
Then the weapon split in two down the barrel, a perfectly made, diagonal cut leading from the bottom of the barrel`s tip to just above the back of the firing chamber, causing the top half to slide forward and then fall off entirely to the ground with a metallic clank while the masked assassin resheathed his Khukri, mask sliding up briefly as if he was smiling beneath it.   
  
"Tell me Harlock, do you honestly think you can win?"   
  
"I have a better point to make," Mark replied smugly, pointing to his right with one finger. "Observe," he ordered, just as the Shadow Fox came padding around the corner of a campus building, both of it`s forward guns slinging out of their hidden and/or fixed positions to swerve just a bit and lock onto Arihmanes` solitary form.   
  
"Point made."   
  
"Concession accepted, gimpy," Mark stated insultingly. "Of course. But when the fire comes, only I will be there to protect her. You and your Zoid both... Well," he trailed off as the Fox growled uneasily, promptly swinging it`s AZ 30 around to lock onto a Lightning Saix as it appeared from nowhere, menacingly staring down at the other Zoid from a few dozen meters away, both guns fixed to fire directly onto it.   
  
"I believe that makes us even, does it not?" Arihmanes asked.   
  
"Not by a long shot."   
  
"Of course not. I`ll take good care of her for you, you know..."   
  
"... Keep the hell a-" Mark paused as Arihmanes all but vanished, an action followed by the Saix. An instant passed and there was a loud roar of engines as a Hammershark blazed overhead, vanishing in a chameleon-like color shift, followed by a distant sonic boom.   
  
"... Now I`m _really_ pissed," Mark growled ferally, swiping the remains of his shotgun off of the ground and storming towards the Shadow Fox.   
  
  
Jamie sighed in relief as he was finally shot down, ending his tenure in the overly drawn out arcade battle as the virtual reality cockpit slid open with a false gasp of air, allowing him to step out and wipe some of the sweat from his forehead and onto the shoulder of his shirt. It hadn`t been taxing to keep playing for so long, to be honest, but it _had_ been fairly hot inside the simulator, Jamie guessed that it was due to the fact that none of the things were air conditioned, but didn`t let it bug him too much.   
  
_ "How long `til Leyla finishes?"_ He wondered to himself, watching the girl`s score continue piling up by the truckloads. _"At this rate, probably around the same time they kick you us out for staying here past closing time,"_ the Wild Eagle replied. _"And I thought **I** had a problem being optimistic,"_ Jamie commented. _"You do,"_ the other pointed out sourly.   
  
"Took ya long enough," Jamie said after having watched the game for another five or six minutes, where Leyla finally exited on her own and emerged from the cockpit holding a strip of tickets roughly three and a half feet long, more than twice the length of the one Jamie had accumulated in the course of his time in the game, causing the teen to gape a bit in surprise before straightening up, just as she started speaking. "Not my fault the competition here is kinda lax..."   
  
"Yeah, I know."   
  
"What now?" Leyla asked casually, tucking her hands into her pockets. "Could get some lunch or continue to terrorize the arcade," Jamie replied with the same tone and a shrug, trying to think of things to say without embarrassing himself.   
  
"Hmm... Your call," Leyla finally said after a brief pause. "Eh... You pick," Jamie ordered. "Nah, you," Leyla replied with a snicker. "Fine, fine..." Jamie`s choice was made by a brief rumble in his stomach, nothing _too_ loud of course, but still. "Guess I shouldn`t`ve skipped breakfast, huh?" He asked sheepishly. "That makes two of us," Leyla replied. "Pizza?" She asked. "Sure," Jamie answered as the two teens exited the arcade, leaving more than a few people to breathe a sigh of relief.   
  
  
"Hello?" Brad asked after the hospital phone finished ringing. "That you, Hunter?" A familiar voice asked. "What do you want, Harlock?" Brad asked with an almost sour tone of voice. "A little help and the chance to provide a little warning to one of your team mates, Jamie Hameros - I think," Mark replied. He sounded angrier than Brad had thought at first, a lot less patient as well.   
  
"What happened?" Brad asked in a sigh, plopping down into the nearest vacated chair as Leena stirred out of her sleep. "Who`s that?" She asked, recieving a motion to pause from Brad. "A guy calling himself Arihmanes came after me early today, making a threat that if I didn`t help him, he`d try and kill me. He`s also trying to stalk my girlfriend."   
  
"That explains why you sound like you just took a dump on a landmine," Brad replied sardonically. "But how does this involve us?" He asked. "Just after I took in the Shadow Fox a few weeks ago - before my match with Bit Cloud - I was ambushed by a rogue Gunsniper. At the time, I thought it was just a gang, but when I... Persuaded the guys who attacked me after I took the Zoid down into giving me their home base`s location, I found it was more or less a military outpost of some kind, unlisted on any maps I could find."   
  
"I see."   
  
"The Arihmanes guy I told you about, he had the same symbol on his clothing as on the Gunsniper, and on the base itself. Called it 'Riven Facility,'" Mark informed. "And how does this tie in with Jamie?" Brad asked curiously. There was a shocked pause.   
  
"Damn... He didn`t tell you guys?"   
  
"Tell us what?"   
  
"I wasn`t the one who trashed the base. Some crazy bastard stole one of their Pteras Zoids and fragged everything there, I recognized the voice from when he ordered me to cover the escape of a few of their prisoners. Sounded like Jamie, but a little more..."   
  
"Confident?"   
  
"Yeah. That`s it. He killed a few gaurds according to the people I helped escape, then shot down virtually every Zoid there, jumped out of the Pteras just before it drove into what I think was the base`s main power plant and that`s the last I saw of him."   
  
"I see..." Brad nodded quietly. "And if the people associated with that base sent someone to off you..."   
  
"Exactly. I managed to get a picture of the symbol on the Gunsniper, but I don`t have anything I can use to cross reference it. You guys on the other hand," he trailed off. "Logical choice," Brad commented. "Alright, we`re at the Padre Medical Center, room #448, Warrior Treatment Wing," Brad informed. "Got it, want me to look for that Jamie guy?"   
  
"No, we have someone who can do that already," Brad replied as Bit exited the bathroom, looking about six and a half pounds lighter than when he`d gone in. "Don`t go in there," he ordered plainly, reaching back in and flipping the fan on before slamming the door inside shut.   
  
"Okay, I`ll be over as soon as I can. Gotta make sure that bastard isn`t still lounging around on campus first..."   
  
"Yeah, see you then," Brad replied dryly, putting the phone back on it`s rest and glancing over at Bit. "You know where Jamie was going, right?" He asked. Bit gave a nod. "Good, I need you to go get him on the double... Bring a gun if you think you have to," Brad stated, already getting to his feet and heading for the door himself. "What about you?" Bit asked. "I`m gonna get the Doc," Brad answered, already out of the door by the time Bit finished registering his words.   
  
"What about me?" Leena asked, even though she`d gotten the words out just as Bit had left the room, darting down the hallway by the time the door shut. Privately, she condemned her own inability to be of any use at the moment, and even more privately, she condemned Vega for having indirectly caused her to wind up bedridden in a hospital, scarred and left with vision that would probably require corrective surgery or glasses to fix.   
  
  
Leyon smiled despite himself. Injured still, only having escaped from the hospital on a fluke the day before - in his wheelchair no less - and having spent the rest of that day lying in a timed regenerative chamber he`d built himself off of plans thought up from the known pods of Ancient Zoidians. A bandage around his head and a padded, metallica vest around his ribcage to act as a support mechanism for his sore upper body, he was still smiling. That was because he had done what was considered utterly impossible to most of the so-called scientists in his fields of genius   
  
"Finished," he said to himself, regarding the interior of his greatest creation to date. Fourteen years of work on hyperevolving Zoid cores, half of it with Steve`s help, half of it without. Months of kneeling to the demands of the Backdraft Group while hiding the project from them at the same time, months of leeching from their resources and personnel, trillions of dollars of money stolen from them with the proper hacking techniques to convince them otherwise...   
  
It had all paid off as he regarded the perfectly finished command and control room - the bridge, if you will - of his finest creation. There were a few kinks to work out of it, of course, there always were, but he had done good anyway.   
  
"Now all that`s left is to make sure it can never be used the wrong way," he thought aloud, his voice carrying something of an echo. Stepping over to the main control panel of the enormous room, Leyon cracked his neck and sat down in the pilot`s seat, cracking his knuckles and setting the empty cup of what had been ramen noodles down into the trashcan hidden in the chair`s right side, smacking it shut a second later.   
  
"Here we go," he mumbled, opening up the access panels and going to work.   
  


_ End Chapter Twelve_  


  


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**Author`s Note:** Fear the evil geniuses... So you know, it`ll be a few days before I update again. Probably a week or two, kinda stalled on chapter thirteen and being pressed into work around the house, not to mention having to go visit my grandparents on Thanksgiving :\ See ya when I see ya, leave a review and enjoy until then!  
  
Sh33p out. 


	14. The Fateful Meeting and the Challenges

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I don`t own Zoids.  
  


* * *

  
  


** New Age  
** The Fateful Meeting and the Challenges   
  
  
  


"... Eh?" Jamie voiced, glancing up from his food and looking off towards the main entrance to the Food Court. "Someone you know?" Leyla asked curiously, shifting her gaze to follow Jamie`s as a slightly familiar young man with blonde hair practically waltzed through the doors. "Yeah. What`s Bit doing here?" Jamie asked himself, putting down his food and waiting for the other to spot them.   
  
It didn`t take long though, Bit`s vision was surprisingly accurate even when trying to pick out one person amid a fairly crowded area - even when that person was sitting down. Bit rose an arm and gave a wave over to Jamie before breaking into a near sprint.   
  
"Hey..." Jamie said with a raised eyebrow as Bit went skidding on the freshly cleaned floor, toppling over backwards and sliding along to thud against the central leg of the table before springing back up in a blur. "We need to get back to the hospital," he stated rapidly, almost as if nothing had happened just now. "Something wrong with Leena?" Jamie asked hurriedly. "No, worse..."   
  
"What could be worse? Did she try and blow up one of the nurses? Again?"   
  
"... Well... I don`t really think I should talk about it in the open," Bit replied uneasily, glancing around in a semi-paranoid manner. "... You`ve lost your mind, haven`t you?" Jamie asked. "I didn`t have one to begin with," Bit replied, probably not hearing Jamie`s comment correctly over the hustle of the crowds. _"... I`m tempted to agree,"_ the Wild Eagle muttered. _"I`m tempted to join you,"_ Jamie added.   
  
"Bit Cloud?" Leyla finally asked. "That`s my name, don`t wear it out," he answered, glancing down at Leyla. "_Oh_! That explains how Jamie is so good in the simulators!" She finally realized, glancing over at Jamie. "Why didn`t you tell me you were on the Blitz Team? We can have a match sometime!" She announced happily. Jamie only glared daggers sideways up at Bit, not uttering a word.   
  
"You must be that Leyla girl," Bit mused, losing his sense of urgency for a moment. _"... I`d guess five seconds before he goes on a humiliator tyrade,"_ the Wild Eagle commented. _"He won`t get the chance,"_ Jamie replied, promptly standing up as Bit began to try and do just that, then grabbing the other Blitz Team member by the right ear and speaking up.   
  
"Sorry we had to cut this short Leyla, same time, same place, next week?" Jamie asked. "Sure! I`ll call you!" Leyla shouted as the two youths exited, one flailing about as he was dragged off, the other looking annoyedly resolute.   
  
Neither of them really bothered to look for the huge man currently engaged in the process of buying his son some ice cream, watching them both with menacing intent.   
  
  
Vega let out an unenthusiastic snort at the sight before him. The Fury was only barely being tolerant of all the devices being used to provide maintenance on it, in specific, the huge six ringed magnetic device used to coax a Zoid into healing itself while at the same time running diagnostics on it.   
  
_ "You`ll be out of there soon Fury..."_ Vega promised, watching the black, unarmored Zoid with eyes that looked as haunted as those of his older brother, though one was still swollen somewhat. The Fury growled in response. _"Just remember our new mission..."   
  
_** Zero... **  
  
_ "Bit and the Liger can wait. We have to get to Class S first anyway, then we`ll be able to open season on both of them, but this time - it`ll be **friendly**,"_ Vega thought, ignoring the shock caused by the sudden emergence of a second voice he had just heard in his mind. It almost felt natural though, like he should have been hearing it all the time but was never quite paying enough attention to register any of the words at all. The Fury rumbled out something in resolute annoyance, but even if it had been what Vega had just heard, it didn`t speaking any further.   
  
"Stigma," Vega paused. "Don`t you own a team?" He asked quietly, leering up at his current legal gaurdian. "I own several," he replied dryly. "Are you looking to join one?" He asked. "Not quite..." Vega replied, at about the same instant that Stigma finally looked up at the Berserk Fury and took note of the fact that it had none of it`s armor on at the moment.   
  
"... I see," he stated with a slow nod.   
  
"Exactly."   
  
  
"Everyone here?"   
  
"Take a look around, numbskull," Leena answered dryly at her decidedly unwelcome visitor. Steven and Jamie were currently settled at the table, Bit had posted himself behind them and Brad was smoothly leaning against a wall, with Marcus sitting in front of everyone at the opposite end of the table from Jamie and the Doc. "I get the point," he grumbled in response, finally taking out the picture from his vest pocket and passing it along to Jamie. "Think you can do a search on it?" He asked. Jamie was about to nod when Bit intervened.   
  
"I think I`ve seen that somewhere," he commented curiously, swiping the picture from Jamie. "Any idea who uses it?" Mark asked. "Yeah, actually," Bit replied. "Who?" Steven asked with concern.   
  
"They`re called the Rommel Corporation, buncha black marketeers based outta Southern Nyx. Most I`ve ever seen of them was the few times I ran into `em and they held me up for the spare parts I scavenged," he explained. "You left out the fact that they`re not exactly a humanitarian outfit," Brad pointed out. "You`ve heard of `em too, eh?" Bit asked. "I used to work for them before I got registered to the ZBC. Hard group of people, they`d chew up most of the Backdraft for lunch and be ready for dessert before they finished," Brad replied.   
  
"Even the guys like Vega and Kale?"   
  
"Hell no. The average Backdraft member wasn`t much worse, but the Rommel Corpers tend to fight in numbers, usually by the twos and threes but the last I heard, they were gearing up for a full scale mobilization."   
  
"When was that?" Mark asked. "Two, maybe three years ago. I wasn`t in on many details, none of the foot soldiers, mercenaries and mechanics were, but if that was a few years ago, they`ve probably finished mobilizing by now. The real question is: What are they mobilizing for?" He asked. "Agreed... Any idea who their leader is?" Steven asked.   
  
"Not a clue. Last I heard it was a guy named Surak - real nutcase who renamed himself after a character on a TV show, now I`m not sure. Rumor had it as I was leaving that someone bumped him off," Brad replied.   
  
"And none of this helps us with the threat against Jamie," Leena cut in. "Or me, for that matter," Mark grumbled. "No one cares," Leena chided dryly before returning to the subject at hand. "Any ideas on who they could be sending after you, Jamie?" She asked.   
  
"... Not really..." Jamie said uncertainly. "That Leyla girl, perhaps?" Steven asked.   
  
"... No, not her. She`s too nice."   
  
Leena frowned. "How did you meet her?" She asked. "At the arcade," Jamie answered annoyedly. "I think she meant, 'How did you meet her at the arcade?'" Brad cut in. "... She just started playing a game with me. I didn`t even notice her until she started beating my score..." He lied, intentionally leaving out the part about the Wild Eagle, much to his alter ego`s annoyance.   
  
Bit and Brad exchanged sideways glances from across the room and then looked back at Jamie. "Just be careful around her and look for anything you need to be on gaurd for, alright?" Steve asked. "... Fine," Jamie grumbled.   
  
"As for you," Steve glanced over at Marcus. "If we can come up with anything, we`ll let you know. Try and get some information out of that Arihmanes fellow in your match tomorrow, got it?" He asked. The former Gustav trucker gave a grim nod. "Assuming I don`t kill him first," he muttered, standing up and heading for the door. "Catch you guys later," he said, passing by Brad only to be halted in mid-step by the former mercenary grabbing his arm. "Eh?"   
  
"We need to have a match one of these days," Brad ordered more than suggested. Mark gave a nod. "Yeah. We do. See you around," he said again, finally leaving as Brad shut the door. "What was that all about?" Bit asked. "I know," Leena cut in. "Brad`s just jealous that nobody`s managed to punk him out yet after he stole the Shadow Fox," she smirked. "Not quite," the former mercenary replied. "Scout just wants the chance to prove he`s better than Shadow," he stated cryptically.   
  
  
"... So..."   
  
There was another pause, probably only one of a select few in the hours-long conversation.   
  
"How`d the kid take it when you crashed?" Harabec asked, still leaned on the bar, though he and Oscar had relocated from earlier when workers and customers started pouring in, moving off to the side and nearest to the wall for an inkling of privacy as they continued to catch up on old times.   
  
"Jamie? Well... I think it scarred him pretty bad," Oscar answered after several seconds. "Funny too, none o` the damage you did to me showed up until right as I was crashing," the more portly of the two former champions mused. "Heh. Guess it figures though, if I`d`ve aced that one shot I tried to take at your engines, it woulde`ve been a total draw..."   
  
"Could`ve," Oscar corrected. "Would`ve," Harabec corrected in reply. "Should`ve?" Oscar asked. "Probably," Harabec answered, taking a sip of his water and straightening up. "Alright, time for me to stop throwin` all the work on the kids," he stated, turning to head for the register as Oscar hauled himself off of his stool and stood up uneasily, shaking out one leg and then the other. "Yeah, see ya around, Rev," the former Wild Eagle said with a half wave before tucking his hands into his pockets and heading for the door.   
  
"You too," Harabec replied with a small wave of his own before tapping the young man at the register on the shoulder and pointing towards the kitchen with a lazy nod.   
  
  
"Hello, Kyle," a dry, emotionless voice stated as the scruffy dressing youth turned around annoyedly. "You again?" He asked with a snort. "Not again, still," the other corrected. "I`m not interested in fighting you again Rayth, not yet," Kyle growled annoyedly at his former friend.   
  
"I`m not visiting you about that. I already clipped your Griffin`s wings, no point in kicking you before you`re back up," Rayth stated dryly. "I`m interested in knowing how my sister`s doing," he explained plainly. Rayth Takahori was many things, he was a little on the short side, more muscular pound-for-pound than Kyle was and resembled something of a vague cross between old pictures of legendary pilots like Raven and General Karl Schubaltz, even bearing out a similar marking beneath his right eye to the one that Raven had been tattooed with early in life. His clothing resembled a mixture of a military uniform and the kind of pilot`s outfit worn by Vega, scaled up and darkened drastically.   
  
"She`s doing fine, not that it should really concern you," Kyle replied. "... Still bitter about that incident around the Tharen Mountain range?" Rayth asked, his emotionless facade briefly dropping for a slight bit of smugness to breeze through. "Not really, I actually owe you one over it," Kyle replied with the same tone. "Because of it, I got my hands on an even better Zoid than the Griffin," he stated proudly. "Is that so? Well, I guess I`ll have to clip your wings again, now won`t I?" Rayth asked with a smirk.   
  
"Doesn`t have wings to clip," Kyle said with a two fingered salute, turning around and continuing on.   
  
He would have anyway, but for the gloved hand that grabbed his shoulder and promptly yanked him back around, almost throwing him off of his feet. "You`ll battle me again Kyle - soon," the shorter of the two growled. "No I won`t, I don`t care about fighting you. I have more important things to do," the other replied dryly. "Still chasing the pipe dream of getting to Class S? Give up, you couldn`t even beat me when I stacked the odds in your favor," Rayth muttered.   
  
"That was before. Just wait," Kyle sternly advised. "I thought you didn`t care?" Rayth stated, using Kyle`s own words against him. "I don`t, which is exactly why I`m leaving, _bye_," Kyle replied, turning and walking off to rejoin the crowds of people at the mall, leaving Rayth to simmer to himself.   
  
"Hell`s going to freeze over before you finish with me without my say-so," he growled, storming off in the opposite direction.   
  
  
_"What now?"_ Jamie asked lazily, hopping out of the jeep with a pair of soft thumps, followed by Bit a few seconds later. "You comin` Brad?" The Royal Cup champion asked. "Nah, I`m goin` to see Naomi," Brad answered, pulling the jeep into reverse, exiting the hangar and promptly blazing off into the afternoon sun, heading back towards the city.   
  
"... I`m almost tempted to get the other jeep, follow him and make fun of them both," Bit commented sarcastically as Jamie walked towards the Raynos.   
  
_ "You notice it earlier?"   
  
"Notice what?"_ Jamie asked, lazily beginning to climb up the ladder to the catwalk, intent on checking for internal problems with the Zoid. It`s wings weren`t finished repairing yet, but it`s command system had been acting up somewhere whenever Jamie tried to walk it around the hangar ever now and then. Common knowledge held that 'injured' Zoids tended to self repair faster if they were kept at least partially active, at least once a day. Jamie had been taking the Raynos for brief walks around the hangar and the base because of that fact, but the day before it had been a little slow to respond.   
  
_ "Remember when she said we have two reflections in each eye?"_ The Wild Eagle asked.   
  
"... Yeah, what about it?" Jamie asked, stepping onto the catwalk as Bit inanely babbled over to the Liger Zero, which growled out at random several times in response.   
  
_ "Well... Did you notice it?"   
  
_ "Notice what?" Jamie asked again, hopping into the Raynos` cockpit as the glass slid shut.   
  
_ "... You didn`t notice it?"   
  
"... What in the heck are you talking about?"_ Jamie demanded annoyedly. The Wild Eagle paused, but only for a few seconds.   
  
"... We have two. She has three."   
  
  
"Definately explains why Jamie was moping alright," Brad thought dryly, reaching down and thoughtfully hesitating. It was a choice of what to do and for what reasons he wanted to do it, a choice of who he valued more, his team or the woman he was allowing himself to slowly feel things for.   
  
The pause continued.   
  
Brad slowly started to pull his hand away from the car phone, pausing again at half-way as doubt and thought clashed with one another in consideration. It wasn`t an easy choice really, he`d been meaning to have some time with Naomi quite a bit lately, but this was serious enough that it could be considered a threat to his job, his own life and the lives of a few others, and what if the worst happened in a battle?   
  
_ "Naomi`ll understand,"_ Brad finally thought with a sigh, reaching back down and starting to dial in the numbers for Naomi`s personal cell phone.   
  


_ End Chapter Thirteen  
  
_

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**Author`s Note:** Sorry for makin` ya wait so long! Hope you liked this one :/  
  
**Shiro:** Ah! *Sends Austin Powers after Shiro. Evil genius pun.*  
  
That`s all for now, Sh33p out! Enjoy, review and see ya next time! 


	15. Confrontations

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I don`t own Zoids.  
  


* * *

  
  


** New Age**  
Confrontations   
  
  
  


Jamie yawned as he got out of bed. It hadn`t exactly been a very easy night on him given how much he had been thinking things through, the fact that his hair was knotted and tangled up in such a way that it made Bit and Brad`s look comparitively orderly pretty much tipped off how much trouble he`d had sleeping. The Wild Eagle likely wasn`t even awake yet, not much of a surprise since it tended to 'sleep' a few hours later than Jamie, a fact which meant that the teen actually had some mental privacy for a little while each morning.   
  
Of course, privacy was overrated when one couldn`t see anything. Some genius had apparently had the wherewithal to turn out all the lights in a complex that spanned almost a three football fields in all directions, leaving the teen to fumble around in the dark for several minutes, stumbling through the hallway and trying to find a lightswitch in the process.   
  
But all bad things must come to an end, and this one ended with a swish of a door as the youth toppled over forward and landed on his stomach in what felt like the living room area of the base. That was at least slightly tolerable because he could find a lightswitch now. Assuming he thought to pay attention to that anymore, a familiar-yet-accusational voice had pretty much nixed the likelihood of Jamie doing anything like that.   
  
The voice and the fact that the wall-sized monitor placed directly across the span of the living room floor had just lit up with an image of the destroyed Riven Facility.   
  
"Hard to believe you could cause so much destruction in only one day," the voice stated, alarming in it`s familiarity as the teen got up to his feet and angrily glared over his shoulder, now clearly able to see the outline and basic features of one Brad Hunter, who apparently hadn`t come in until late last night.   
  
"I didn`t do that," Jamie seethed.   
  
"Then who did?"   
  
"The Wild Eagle," Jamie answered angrily. "... Eh?" Brad asked. "I thought you could control him?" He asked again. "_No_, I can`t. Those idiots made the mistake of making him promise to kill them, got it now?" Jamie answered with a glare. "I see. So I`m basically working with a homicidal maniac," Brad commented sarcastically. "... Oh, like it`s any different from having Leena around? At least I`m only a threat to people`s lives on the battlefield, you ever see her in the middle of a bargain sale?" Jamie asked annoyedly. "Yes actually. Attempted mass murder comes to mind," Brad answered dryly.   
  
"Good then. Now will you _please_ turn the damn lights back on and get that picture off the screen?! And while you`re at it, don`t tell anyone, will ya?" Jamie asked, trying to be calm. "I`ll tell them if it becomes a threat to our survival, otherwise I don`t really care," Brad stated honestly. "Gee, glad to know I can count on you," Jamie muttered. "Yeah, isn`t it? One last question though..."   
  
"What?" Jamie asked.   
  
"Where were you last night prior to 1:00 AM?" Brad asked curiously. "... I was asleep..."   
  
"Another lie. I checked the surveilance cameras to the hangar, Jamie. You went out at around 10:30 and didn`t come back until 1:45 last night," Brad replied sharply. "... That can`t be right, I could swear I was asleep..."   
  
  
Mark and the Shadow Fox shared a growl as they entered into the battlefield. "Smart guy," he commented sourly, which the Fox seemed to nod in agreement of. The battlefield had been picked out pretty well by the other fighter, it was a virtual urban canyon, an ancient, abandoned city which had obviously been remodeled recently to some extent or another. Marcus could tell this because there were Lightning Saix-sized holes formed in such a way that it would be virtually impossible to find an extremely tight turning point, leaving the city with dozens upon dozens more straight paths, while offering too little room for the Fox to make use of it`s acrobatics.   
  
Not exactly a good sign.   
  
"Definately did his homework," he added, causing the Fox to growl lightly in agreement. "Judge should be arriving soon..."   
  
Almost on the proverbial period dotting the end of Mark`s words, there were two loud crashes at the very edge of the city, each coming from differing directions and the second seeming to consume the sound of the first, not to mention causing a fairly visible fireball, which Marcus could spot from several hundred yards away as having happened at the very edge of the city-turned-battlefield.   
  
"I see you made it after all," Arihmane`s smugly pointed out as the Lightning Saix phased into view directly in front of the Shadow Fox, though seperated from it by a good amount of distance, visible through the holes in buildings, spaces between them caused by streets and surrounded by a sudden whip-up of dust, standing darkly across from the other Zoid without a single movement. "I almost thought you`d have the common sense to run away."   
  
"You promised to kill me if I did."   
  
"I`m going to kill you either way so it`s really a moot point," Arihmanes stated. "... Gee... Bet your momma`s proud of you," Marcus grumbled. "Assuming I hadn`t killed her, wouldn`t surprise me," Arihmanes replied. "We gonna start or what?" Mark asked. "Therein lies the problem with fairness..."   
  
** "The area within a seven mile radius is a designated Zoid battlefield."   
  
** "A problem with fairness?" Mark asked.   
  
"Yes. Just keep listening..."   
  
** "This zone is now restricted. Only combatants and Rommel Corporation employees are allowed."   
  
** "**_WHAT?!_**"   
  
** "Everyone else can _GET THE HELL OUT!_"   
  
** And with that, a large, black rod shot up into the air, going to the very middle of the city before tearing apart, shattering into hundreds of smaller rods, all of them a dark shade of green and all of them somehow landing at the very edge of the battlefield, and at about that time, the battlefield itself was suddenly ringed in darkened, greenish-tinted flame rising up by almost twice the height of even the tallest conventional Zoids.   
  
** "Area scanned. Battlefield enclosed, reinforcements waiting. Arihmanes versus Marcus Harlock, Battlemode 1943, deathmatch. Ready?" **  
  
"... Yanno..." Mark began, only to be cut off by the intensely annoyed growling of the Shadow Fox. "Yeah. That`s about right," he mumbled to himself in reply to the Zoid, glancing over at the Judge, now visible since the dust and smoke had cleared away, revealing it to look like a more menacing Dark Judge, save that it was colored an extremely dark green.   
  
** "Die!"   
  
** And at the very moment that the Judge finished, the Shadow Fox dodged to the side on reflexive instinct, a pair of energy bolts coursing through the air alongside it in the process, heading right into the fires and punching out into the distance, even as several smaller impacts landed on the side of the Shadow Fox, knocking it back towards the opening it had just moved away from as a Helcat uncloaked a small distance away, packing relatively light weaponry.   
  
"Get in the city," the pilot ordered sternly, taking several shots at the Fox`s feet, all of which narrowly missed as the Zoid darted past the outermost buildings and into the city, promptly cutting a sharp turn and dodging out of the way of the Saix` guns once again, narrowly stopping short of slamming into a building.   
  
"... This really sucks," Mark muttered.   
  
  
There was a roar throughout the hangar, shocking several of the mechanics upright, even as a long shadow was cast, heralded further by the sounds of enormous feet slapping harshly against the smooth, metallic floor. Stigma Stoller walked ahead of the hulking form of the Berserk Fury, which itself was being followed by a custom made Gustav. Silence followed as the cockpit of the enormous Zoid slipped open and Vega Obscura calmly stood up from within, having undone the safety harness almost like it was second nature mere moments before.   
  
"Listen up people, there`ll be a few changes in here for now," Stigma barked out, drawing the mechanics to attention even more than they already had been before. "I want the Elephander moved out to the Whale King, and convert the transformation armor maintenance and production facilities of this hangar over to the same size and shape parameters of the armor of the Berserk Fury! You have three hours, make them count!" Stoller ordered. "Now get to work!"   
  
_ "Hear that, Fury?"_ Vega asked. The Zoid rumbled out something in affirmation. _"Looks like my prediction took a while, but after this, you`ll be stronger than ever..."   
  
_** What about you?   
  
** Vega fought off the urge to scream in surprise, plopping back down into the cockpit chair and cracking his neck. _"I just need more battles to get stronger. For now though, I want you to let these people get to know you, we`ll be going back home once the armors are done but..." _  
  
Vega paused thoughtfully. _"We may be going back home as part of a team. Mind that?"_   
  
** ... As long as they don`t get in the way. **  
  
_ "They won`t. It`ll just be you and me with a mechanic crew, most likely."   
  
_** Most likely?   
  
__** "... Right. Definately then," Vega agreed, somehow spotting a hint of wisdom in the odd, multi-toned voice of the Fury, despite the disturbing effects of having a second mind speaking inside of his own. "Won`t be long now," he mumbled to himself, regarding the rapid stir of movement as the mechanics in the hangar scurried about to begin their assigned duties, with Stigma nonchalantly heading for the exit.   
  
  
Explosions sounded off and the Shadow Fox dove through a sharp right angle turn, narrowly avoiding the side of the building on it`s left in the process. There was a loud rumble and the Lightning Saix flashed by, old glass shattering under the force of a sonic boom while the Fox came to a near complete stop, strutting backwards as fast as it could.   
  
"Any ideas yet?" Mark asked his Zoid watching the scanners carefully as the dot that represented Arihmanes and the Lightning Saix went into a full turn along the edge of the battlefield, heading right of the opening directly in front of the Shadow Fox, a good distance away. The Fox was silent though, practically brooding about it`s current conditions for the most part, but not to the extent that it was helpless. In an instant, the Saix appeared, and the Fox dropped it`s Dual Impact Cannon down into firing mode from it`s hiding place, promptly opening fire in the split second it had available before jumping right out of the way of a number of energy bolts.   
  
There was an explosion as the shots struck against something, but the Saix plowed through the flames and the cloud of smoke they caused like nothing, rushing along down the straight path and out of the city, leaving Marcus and the Fox to share another growl of frustrated contempt.   
  
"I`m really starting to hold a special hatred of this asshole," Mark grumbled. The Shadow Fox only shrieked in agreement.   
  
More energy bolts rained in, and the Shadow Fox darted back down the turn, only to be swept off it`s feet by the sonic boom of the Saix and slammed into the side of the building on it`s right with a loud scream of tortured concrete and steel, the enormous structure immediately beginning to tumble towards the ground around it.   
  
The Fox wasn`t done yet though, if anything, it was just a little angered now, even though it`s pilot was effectively freaking out.   
  
With another scream of concrete and steel, the Shadow Fox literally ripped clear of the debris, punching through the building even as it fell over, foreclaws glowing brightly in attack mode as the Zoid landed from it`s jump and then broke into a sprint, allowing itself to leave the confines of the city and head for the barrier.   
  
"What the hell are you doing?!" Mark yelled, grabbing the controls and trying to turn the Fox around, but the Zoid didn`t respond. Instead, it continued into a wide turn, just as dozens of light impacts rang up off of the ground behind it, all of them coming from a single point, with the vague outline of a Helcat becoming visible each time.   
  
"Oh," Marcus replied to himself dryly, swinging the Fox around freely now and bringing it`s main gun to bear in the process. A lengthy squeeze of the trigger and the Helcat`s cloak went down, a few more seconds and pulse lasers ripped through it`s body, literally sheering the Zoid in half in a matter of seconds. "So you bastards aren`t as unstoppable as you claim to be," Marcus commented with a smirk, just as the Fox shook and rumbled from a dozen impacts coming in from either side, hitting around it`s feet rather than it`s body.   
  
The first reaction for the Fox was to head into the city, but Marcus somehow managed to coax it into doing something on his plan, running around but not into the city. _"Just need to get them to follow,"_ he thought, clumsily swinging the Fox into a number of random dodges in the process.   
  
"Now?" He asked.   
  
The Shadow Fox let out a shriek of agreement, and Mark quickly did as he`d planned, popping open the smoke dischargers and letting loose with a heavy black cloud, the kind that wouldn`t just blow away in a matter of seconds. With another shriek, the Fox whipped around on it`s front legs, waiting for an instant before opening up with it`s main gun, just as two outlines made themselves conveniently visible within the smoke cloud`s edge.   
  
There was a roar of gattling fire and both Helcats went down, explosions immediately ripping their guns and legs off in a violent display before the Fox growled out in pride. "That`s three down Arihmanes, how many more Helcats did they waste trying to ensure your victory?!" Mark demanded over the comm.   
  
"My victory was ensured from the start," Arihmanes replied, just as the Saix tore through the smoke cloud in the middle of a jump, corkscrewing through the air with it`s claws sweeping towards the Fox`s head. The other Zoid was more on the ball with it`s reflexes though, quickly dodging out of the way and - before even Marcus could try and react - springing open it`s tail, the EMP net missile firing in an instant.   
  
The Saix let out a shriek as fifty meters of cabled netting weighted at the edges with steel balls massing in at almost a quarter of a ton each slammed into it, wrapping around in a matter of seconds before the nastiest surprise of all came into play: An electromagnetic shock powerful enough to disable the Lightning Saix` computer systems.   
  
In the cockpit of the Shadow Fox, Marcus grinned to himself. "Not bad, partner," he stated to the Zoid, acknowledging that it had been the Fox which had won the battle. Turning the Shadow Fox around though, Marcus gingerly allowed it to pace towards the Lightning Saix, then swept back one of the claws, using a trigger to activate the Strike Laser attack.   
  
"Now you know why you don`t piss me off," Mark stated calmly, basking in victory as the Fox slashed out with it`s foreclaw, severing through the cables like nothing before slicing the head right off of the Lightning Saix, something that triggered the pilot`s launch in an ejector`s seat instantly. The cockpit blew open and Arihmanes, strapped into the pilot`s chair, flew into view, chair being propelled by several miniature rockets before a parachute blew open and the man was left dangling there, drifting towards the ground while Mark simply snickered, flipping on the loudspeaker.   
  
"Maybe you need a better lesson though..."   
  
The Fox`s main gun tilted out of forward-only, locking onto Arihmanes` position and tracking him as he drifted towards the ground.   
  
"In fact..."   
  
The barrels began to spin, but they didn`t fire.   
  
"I think you do."   
  
And with that, a single shot lanced out of the Laser Vulcan Gun, blasting by Arihmanes with an intentional miss of less than a fraction of an inch, only to vaporize three of the ropes holding the parachute together, sending him drifting through the air and allowing the Fox to snap the main part of the parachute into it`s jaws.   
  
"Have a nice flight!" Marcus cheerily ordered, just as the Shadow Fox leaned it`s head back to the lower left and then slung the parachute`s ropes flying towards the city.   
  
But Arihmanes wasn`t in them.   
  
Seconds passed, and then, in a flash of sparks and electricity, the cockpit glass found itself puncured almost perfectly by Arihmanes` Khukri blade, while the assassin himself seemed to outright vanish from sight. "_Son of a bitch_," Marcus growled, right as the Shadow Fox glanced around and jumped back to make sure that the enemy wasn`t hiding under it, until after several seconds, it stopped.   
  
Arihmanes was no where to be found.   
  
** "Battle over, battle over! The winner is..." **  
  
Marcus grimaced to himself, turning the Fox towards the direction of the Rommel Judge and giving it several seconds.   
  
** "The Rom-"** Several pulse lasers later, the Judge wasn`t ever going to be finishing it`s verdict. The first had torn the head off, the second had put a hole in the body and the third had gouged straight on into the main power plant of the capsule, causing it to erupt into a massive fireball several seconds later, just as the barrier dropped in every location.   
  
"Come on Fox, let`s go," Mark ordered, guiding the Zoid out of the battlefield with an annoyed glint in his eyes.   
  
As for Arihmanes?   
  
He was sitting quietly at the edge of the still-present smoke cloud, the right side of his mask practically burnt into his skin, the part of his shirt on his right shoulder burned off to reveal semi-charred skin beneath it, the sheath for his Khukri now empty. It had been a humiliating loss, but that was okay.   
  
She would still be his in the end.   
  
It was only a matter of time.   
  
  
Palta grimaced to himself at the sight of his destroyed home. He had been lucky that he wasn`t there when it had happened, but that was going to be a pretty penny to have to make up for. Reaching languidly up to scratch the back of his head and grit his teeth together, the former Backdraft member supressed the urge to scream.   
  
Until he noticed the way that the ground was now rumbling every few seconds.   
  
Hanging his head in immediate recognition, Palta slowly turned around and looked up to see the Genosaurer stopping directly in front of him.   
  
"... And I almost thought I`d live to see thirty-five," he muttered in sardonic despair as the Zoid lifted up one foot, the ankle lock preparing to swoop down, directly lined up with Palta`s body.   
  


_ End Chapter Fourteen  
  


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_

**Author`s Note:** This is the last you`ll see of Kale for a little while but... Don`t worry, I`m not done with that little psycho just yet *Dr Evil look.*  
  
**Shiro:** Hope that answered your question a bit :P And no, Arihmanes ain`t done yet... I still have some serious action left for that little bastard.  
  
**Zinou:** Yay! *Throws confetti.* Yeah, the story`s beginning to pick up but it won`t be completely filled with nothing but intensity now... Heck, I have some low key scenes and a **very** special cameo in store still, one that will probably explain quite a bit too. Hopefully you`ll like `em :D  
  
That`s all for now folks, Sh33p out, enjoy, leave a review and see ya next time! 


	16. The Kings Return, Lightning Rematch

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I do not own Zoids.  
  


* * *

  
  


** New Age**  
The King`s Return - Lightning Rematch   
  
  
  


"Looks like you have your first official battle set up," Stigma informed as Vega drearily gazed across the table. "Who?" He asked slowly, looking worn down a bit. It could probably be attributed to the severe emotional toll recent events had dealt him, but he was mostly just adjusting as best he could. It could also be traced to the fact he had woke up into a flashback and come out of it holding a gun to Stigma`s head.   
  
Of course the older veteran brushed that little fact off like it hadn`t even happened, but Vega was obviously a little unnerved by it happening.   
  
"The Lightning Team. Jack Sisco and the Tasker Sisters. I believe you`ve dealt with them before," Stigma answered, tossing a folder across the table and glancing out of the window of the shack that Vega had demanded to call his temporary home during his stay. "Yeah. I tossed the three of them around like rag dolls just before the Royal Cup Tournament," Vega replied with a stifled yawn, ignoring the folder and instead heading for the mini-fridge in what made up the kitchen of the two room living place(the second room was a bathroom).   
  
"They`ve picked up a few new tricks Vega, I`d advise you read over the files before you throw them aside," the former Backdraft commander said, a well placed tinge of experience shining through in his voice. Vega merely ignored him and swiped a can of whatever drink he could get his hands on, preferably something illegal for his age. Even at eleven, he was already beginning to show a strong rebellious streak, easily attributable to a good many things caused by the Backdraft Group.   
  
"How`s the Fury coming along?"   
  
"We`ve finished off one of the conversion armors, the other two are coming along slower than anticipated. The two current armor systems are already being loaded onto a Hammerhead II," Stigma answered. "A Hammerhead II?" Vega asked. "We haven`t picked out a name for it, modified in that it has most of it`s offensive weaponry and internal space removed to play host to the conversion rail system for the Fury and it`s armors," Stigma informed. "Any suggestions?"   
  
"Yeah, the Sky Hammer..."   
  
"That`s taken by another team.   
  
"The Warhammer?"   
  
"Taken as well."   
  
"The Claymore?"   
  
"Taken."   
  
"... The Yuck Fou?"   
  
"... Even if it wasn`t taken, I wouldn`t let it be named that," Stigma replied with an especially unamused, dry tone of voice. "The names we have slated for it so far are the Hammer Fuhrer and the Berserk Kaiser," he added before Vega could try and justify his last choice. "... Did you come up with those, Stig?" The boy asked. The former pilot of the Elephander gave a slow nod. Vega was slackjawed.   
  
"Maybe you`re not such a stingy old bastard after all..."   
  
"Don`t get too comfortable. You may be my legally adopted son but that doesn`t mean you get this for free, I`m charging 50% of the wins from every battle you have until you pay off the debt for the time, money and personnel this has cost me," Stoller replied sharply.   
  
"... Okay, so you _are_ such a stingy old bastard," Vega commented while opening the can and taking a sip.   
  
"Damn straight I am," Stigma shot off before heading to the door with a wave and leaving.   
  
_ "Did he actually just display a sense of humor?"_ Vega asked himself, staring down into the mouth of the freshly opened drink before promptly walking to the sink and pouring it all out.   
  
  
"So, Vega`s accepted the challenge?" Jack asked, leering over at Chris with little amusement in his eyes. "Not personally, but his new sponsor accepted for him," she answered with about the same tone, neither really paying attention to the obsessive way that Kelly was studying a recording of their last encounter with the Berserk Fury. It was a small habit the younger of the two sisters had taken on, she tended to over-analyze each and every loss the trio had until she could spot the **_exact_** reason, move or strategy that had cost them.   
  
"I see," Jack replied after a long pause, sipping his coffee before nodding at Chris to continue. "Vega`s still a little banged up from the beating he took at the hands of that Kale guy that`s been plastered all over the news lately, the area around his left eye is probably still a little swollen..."   
  
"Which means he`d be a little less capable of snap reactions on that side," Kelly informed without missing a beat. "Yeah, pretty much," Chris agreed with a small shrug. "Who`s his sponsor?" Jack asked, only partially interested in the actual battle itself. "Let`s see... Stoller Incorporated."   
  
"So, Stiggy wasn`t bluffing when he told me he had started up a new collection of teams," Jack mused, sounding a bit riled beneath the surface, but nothing out of the ordinary. "You know him?" Chris asked, leaining back against the side of the fairly posh living room of the suite the three had gotten for the time being. Two beds in one room, a bathroom, a kitchenette and a living room. Jack had basically claimed the couch as his own and Kelly was sitting on one of the armrests.   
  
"Yeah. Stoller and I go back a ways to when I was just starting out. He hired me and a guy calling himself 'Bart Huntley' to go into a few battles for him," Jack answered. "What happened?" Kelly asked, pausing the recording and glancing over at the former mercenary. "Bart`s Helcat got fried midway through the first battle and he vanished. I survived and eventually won my Lightning Saix off him as payment for all the cover I provided," he explained taking another sip of his coffee and scratching a spot up under his headband.   
  
"Stoller`s got a real sense of irony then," Chris commented, dropping the paper down onto the table and smirking. "Picking Vega to fight us when we laid an open challenge to any of his teams and all..."   
  
"Stigma`s sense of humor is as warped and invisible as a Whale King`s exhaust trail," Jack stated dryly, speaking up again a second later. "When do we fight him?"   
  
"Today," Chris stated matter-of-factly. "When?" Jack asked again. "Twenty minutes."   
  
"... Yanno Chris, I honestly wonder if you enjoy timing these things the way you do just to watch us squirm," Kelly muttered, literaly fling off of the armrest of the couch and grabbing her pilot`s suit off of the back of a nearby chair. Given that she usually favored lounging around in a pair of jeanshorts and a tanktop, not to mention the fact she was a bit more vane than Chris, she took a little longer to get dressed for battle.   
  
As for Chris herself?   
  
She simply smirked in a smug sort of way at Jack, and then finally answered her sister`s comment. "Yeah, I do. I`ll be waiting," she stated before heading for the door, already having gotten dressed for the battle earlier on.   
  
Jack on the other hand, merely shook his head and stood up, slinging on his jacket and heading for the door without another word.   
  
  
"Who`re you?" Vega asked quietly, leering up at the woman standing in front of him. She was about the same height as his mother, making her relatively tall compared to most women, but she was also a great deal thinner, and a good bit younger than Sarah Obscura was. "Katherine Takahori," the woman stated bluntly. "Surprised you don`t remember me..."   
  
"I remember a Rayth Takahori but I don`t think I ever met his sister," Vega replied dryly. "Ah... Well, that`s me so..." She shrugged. "Are you one of the support crew members Stoller told me about?" Vega asked. "Yeah. Me and several others," she stated with a nod or three.   
  
** Keep them _OUT_ of the way!   
  
** "Just stay off the battlefield and be there when we need you," Vega ordered, walking past the young woman, darting in between an older woman and a man in his mid-thirties, making a byline for the Fury as it lumbered slowly out of the hangar with a roar. "Strange kid," Katherine commented. "All kids are at that age, especially the arrogant ones with big war toys," the man commented. "Can it Pip," the woman ordered annoyedly, smacking the man - who seemed to be her younger brother - across the back of the head. "Fine, fine... You`d think I`d`ve had a concussion by now with all the times ya smack me around."   
  
The woman gave him a deathly glare and he shut up.   
  
As for Vega?   
  
** ... We`ve already defeated them though...   
  
**_ "I didn`t set up the match. Blame Stig."   
  
****_ ... Oh.   
  
"- killed early last night. His home was destroyed by what officials are identifying from trace energy signatures as a charged particle beam. Gunther Palta leaves behind no heirs to the surviving pieces of his impressive Zoid collection, which will probably be sold off at auction to pay for funeral expenses. In other news, Vega Obscura - the former King of Unsanctioned Battles - is going to be making his first official entrance onto the world of sanctioned Zoid Battles in little under fifteen minutes from now, taking on the former rivals of the team that beat him to win the Royal Cup Championship - and the only team to hold a win on the Blitz Team, the Lightning Team. Neither team could be reached for comment, but the bets are already stacking up, even though the battle was only announced two hou-"   
  
Leena flipped the channel annoyedly.   
  
"Hey! Turn it back, I wanted to watch the battle!" Bit complained with annoyance, receiving death glares from both Steven and Leena. "Bit isn`t the only one," Brad intervened. "I happen to want to watch Jack learn a new meaning the word 'defeat,'" he stated calmly, receiving a pair of death glares as well but ending up utterly unphased by them in the least. "That makes three against two," Jamie cut in, setting down on the floor in front of Leena`s bed.   
  
"True, but I happen to own all your asses so **_NYEH!!!_**" The Doc exclaimed boldly, flicking his tongue out at the three warriors in his employ who had disagreed with him. "Anyone else up for a Union?" Brad asked sarcastically. "If we tried that, he`d sic Leena on us," Jamie answered with a wince. "Point taken," Brad replied at the sight of Leena`s slightly distorted, mildly insane looking expression.   
  
"Is she frothing at the mouth?" Bit asked, head cocked to the side.   
  
"Five..." Brad begun, just as an unearthly scream echoed through the room, followed by glass shattering and one Bit Cloud flying out of the nearest window. "**_AND DON`T COME BACK!!!_**" Leena screamed, standing in her robes at the broken window.   
  
"She was early for once... Nice to see she`s almost well enough to leave the hospital," Brad commented mundanely. "And her Bit Radar is still functioning pretty nicely," he observed a second later. As for Bit himself?   
  
He was laying quite nicely in a body imprint made in the roof of a parked taxi, muttering about injustices of teenaged girls with tempers too short and hormones too plentiful for their own good.   
  
  
Tensions were high as the two Gustavs pulled to a dead stop just past the edge of what would be the battlefield, a massive, plain piece of barren land stretching out to a number of mountains in one direction and the start of a forest in the other. The place was known as Imperial Crossing, a band of desert-like terrain stretching across what had once been the edge of territory belonging to the Guylos Empire, later ceded to the Guardian Force, who then turned it over to the Zoid Battle Commission in the interests of giving the people an outlet for their aggressions.   
  
Coincidentally, since the ZBC`s foundation, wars had become fewer and farther in between. The essence of conflict ran deep in the veins of people all over Zi, but now that they had somewhere they could vent it in a controlled environment, it had become something far less violent.   
  
Today though, as Jack hauled himself up and out of the cockpit of his Gustav, making a byline for the trailer as his Lightning Saix freed itself and hopped down, bending it`s head forward and allowing the former mercenary to climb instead, Imperial Crossing was going to be playing host to one of the most surprising battles of the past months, as well as one of the most anticipated.   
  
_ "Good,"_ Jack thought, ignoring Chris and Kelly`s Saix units getting loose and taking on their pilots. He was more focused on the black Hammerhead II that had just flown in overhead, moving straight for the opposite end of the battlefield before angling into a wide turn to face the Gustav`s, hovering just a few hundred feet in the air as a formerly concealed door on it`s belly, nearer the tail of the carrier Zoid, slipped open like a pair of bomb bay doors, bending into a right angle as a silver runway-styled extension slid out into view from within the door itself, two magnetic rails extending up to either side of that.   
  
"He`s here," Kelly announced readily. "I noticed. Any bets on whether or not Stoller came with him?" Jack asked over the broadband, finding himself answered in a fairly nonchalant sort of way.   
  
"Of course I came. Did you think I wouldn`t?"   
  
"You`re a real sick bastard, know that Stig?" Jack asked with a chuckle, bringing his Lightning Saix around and onto the battlefield, followed seconds later by the Taskers. Without giving it a second thought, he flipped channels over to the Lightning Team`s designated line. "Any ideas or should we try the formation trick again?"   
  
"That didn`t work last time," Chris noted. "Kelly and I can distract Vega on his right while you go in from his left, until then we can use the switcher formation," she explained with eagerness. "That should work. If his left eye is still swollen then yes, his reaction time will be down in that direction because he won`t be able to see properly with it, if not then I`m going to get the snot knocked out of me."   
  
"If all else fails we can try and use the Saix Twister," Kelly commented. "He has foot locks, it wouldn`t work," Jack replied, shooting that strategy down in an instant. "Yeah... We`ll have to watch out for his agility too, that thing might be big and stocky but it`s also pretty quick on it`s feet," she warned with audible distaste. Kelly hadn`t quite forgotten how the Fury had knocked her around the first time. "Agreed. Speed-wise it`s only a little faster than the Liger Zero`s base armor, but it has a lot more endurance... It can also fly, for how long, I don`t know, so we`ll need to be careful of that too," Chris warned.   
  
"He should be launching pretty soon, get ready to go into formation," Jack ordered at the sight of electricity lacing between the rails of the Hammerhead II, which had yet to be formally named.   
  
  
The modified Hammerhead II was a fairly impressive Zoid for what it was worth, about the length of the Blitz Team`s HoverCargo and around the same width. The internal transformation railing system was around the same type as that of the HoverCargo, but far more compact, and unlike that CAS unit, the one in the Hammerhead II moved the Zoid, starting at the base armor then moving down through a set of four other stopping points, each with a different set of armor in it, with the final stopping point being used to remove armor. The downside was that it made it a little troublesome to switch armors multiple times in battle.   
  
Vega Obscura, an eleven year old veteran of more Zoid battles than most professionals thrice his age, wasn`t focused on the technical aspect of the Hammerhead II. He was focused on the match ahead of him, and goals beyond that. Shifting uneasily in the cockpit and waiting as the transformation rail kicked into gear, producing a dull hum throughout the Fury`s cockpit. A miniature screan popped up in front of the still-bruised preteen, showing the face of the older woman on his support crew.   
  
"Which armor do you think you`ll be needing?" She asked. "I`ll try the Berserk armor for now, have the other on standby though," Vega answered rapidly, tugging at the rim of his right glove and feeling the momentum shift as the rail unit went into action and begun to slide him down towards the launcher.   
  
The mini-screen blipped off and Vega was again left alone with only his thoughts.   
  
His thoughts and one other`s.   
  
** How much longer? **  
  
"Not too long. We`re launching now, the Judge should be showing up soon after that," Vega answered without really paying much thought to it.   
  
** Good.   
  
** There wasn`t another word between them, the cockpit fell silent for several seconds before Katherine`s voice echoed into Vega`s ears, coming from outside the Fury rather than within.   
  
"Armor system all set, launch rail at full power... Launching Berserk Fury in in five... Four..."   
  
The Fuy came to a stop and then slowly lowered down to another stop, the outside of the Hammerhead II now clearly visible in the main screen. "Three..." The entire cockpit began to tingle a bit, Vega felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. "Two..." The Fury let out a rumble and...   
  
"One. Go!"   
  
There was a full fledged roar as the enormous Zoid went flying through the air, Buster Claws tucked neatly back as they almost always were, bar those times when he was using them in battle like he had against Bit and Kale. The Zoid`s legs were also tucked closely in towards the main body, extending in a flash just prior to a skidding impact with the ground, landing on both feet perfectly as another, far louder impact sounded in the distance.   
  
The Judge had arrived.   
  
** "The area within a five mile radius is a designated Zoid Battlefield. This zone is now restricted. Only competitors and personnel have authorized entry, all others must leave the area at once. Area scanned... Battlefield set up... The Fury Team versus the Lightning Team. Battle Mode 0982. Ready..."   
  
** "As I`ll ever be," Vega muttered to himself, leaning forward in the cockpit, shoulders hunched up into the back of his neck with the heavy armored vest he wore settling onto him uneasily because of it.   
  
** "_FIGHT!_"   
  
** In a blast of movement, the battle began, with the Fury rocketing forth and finding itself hard pressed to try and land a hit on the fast moving Lightning Team, which literally blasted by him with the combined force of no less than three sonic booms roaring into the side of the Berserk Fury in the process. Vega`s teeth rattled but the Zoid kept moving, literally plowing through the drag of the three Saix and coming to a stop several hundred feet behind them, already whipping around as the three began to make their next pass.   
  
** Here they come.   
  
**_ "I know,"_ Vega replied, swinging the Buster Claws forward and pressing the triggers for rapid fire, sending off several pulsed beams at the incoming attacks, even as the three of them started shuffling positions, and in doing so changing their general location, with the line moving one Saix-width to the right or left each time.   
  
"You`re going down this time!" Kelly Tasker`s voice sounded over the broadband. "Say`s your mom," Vega replied hotly, bringing the Fury up and off the ground in a boosted jump, allowing the three to pass beneath him and then further riding the sonic shockwave like a surfer to try and close in on them, the Zoid swinging itself around on instinct in the process.   
  
"On my mark!" Jack`s voice sounded as the Fury began getting closer, to the extent that it was almost at the very edge of it`s striking range. "_Mark_!" Jack`s voice sounded again, louder this time. In truly perfectly timed unison, all three of the Lightning Saix units jumped off of the ground and into the air, each one executing a just as perfectly timed backflip at the height of the jump, and each one of them passing above the Fury to land in the very edge of the sonic shockwave, which allowed the three ace pilots to literally throw their Zoids forward and land back in formation without a single hitch, though this time they picked a formation which wasn`t as constricted, with Jack falling a bit behind and the Tasker sisters moving ahead to either side, Jack firing off first and then Chris and Kelly taking shots at the same time, trying to sandwhich Vega into a triangle of firepower from behind.   
  
The young warrior wasn`t exactly falling for it though, the jets in the Fury`s legs suddenly hauling it right, out of the way of the incoming attacks and just out of range for the three of them swerve and continue their attack, forcing them to turn if they wanted to try it again.   
  
That meant that Vega had several seconds to catch his breath.   
  
"I don`t think you guys know what you`re up against," Vega said with a smirk, watching the three enemy Zoids split up, two going one way, the third going the other, but all three of them turning around just the same. "And neither do you," Chris chided, just as she and Kelly began to open fire from Vega`s lift. The Fury hopped back and out of the way each time but it was effective nonetheless, keeping the pilot`s attentions off of the incoming Jack Sisco.   
  
But not the Zoid`s.   
  
Despite Vega`s commands, the Fury suddenly stopped any and all movement, allowing Jack to close the distance before suddenly, and utterly unexpectedly, a flare of pinkish energy lit up off of the ground into a sphere around the large Zoid, just as Jack brought his Saix into a jumping lunge, causing the former mercenary to swing around on the Fury`s energy shield, finding itself being burnt in several places - mainly the stomach - as a result before Vega took control back from the Fury, just as the Lightning Saix was airborn, taking the opportunity to bend the Zoid forward and whip the tail upward, catching Jack`s Saix on the side of the neck and sending it flying into the ground with a hard bounce and several spins by the end of it all.   
  
"Jack!" Chris yelled, veering off course while Kelly poured on the speed, streaking beneath the Fury`s tail and swinging around on her Saix` forepaws, opening fire instantly and tagging the Fury`s left Buster Claw arm, knocking the larger Zoid off balance just long enough to leave it wide open. With a vengeful cry, Kelly`s Lightning Saix burst forward in the air, one foreleg drawn completely back before being sent forward in a flash at point blank, ripping into the connector joints for the Berserk Fury`s back unit, tearing off the entire thing in one fell swoop.   
  
"_Payback_!" Kelly exclaimed.   
  
"In spades!" Vega retorted, and just as he did, the Fury twisting around, catching Kelly`s Saix across the side with it`s tail and sending her flying along to crash down next to where Jack was just now getting back up out of his rut, with Chris currently being the only member of the Lightning Team able to go on the attack in an instant.   
  
The back unit of the Fury slammed into the ground a small distance away from it, but Vega paid no attention, waiting idly as Chris took her sweet time, obviously trying to give Kelly and Jack the chance to fully recover.   
  
She wouldn`t get it.   
  
** Now!   
  
** Vega could only agree with the Fury`s frantic scream, bringing the Zoid into a high speed rush forward and dodging aside through several bolts of fire from Kelly, narrowly avoiding each before coming up to point blank, crouched down to an extent before the Saix tilted on it`s back legs, trailing sparks from the chin due to a massive headbutt, but not before Jack could finish getting to his feet and opening fire, catching the Fury off guard completely in the chest with several shots before Chris` Lightning Saix crashed down into it, sending both back down for the count several seconds later.   
  
Vega and the Fury came to a stop after the impacts at around the same time, having been thrown a good distance from the Lightning Team as a result.   
  
Not that it mattered to Vega of course.   
  
Two loud clamps sounded and the tail of the Fury suddenly extended out, becoming rigid as the armored vents flipped open while the entire body bent forward, mouth swinging open completely with a roar. The barrel of the Charged Particle Cannon slid out to full extension and Vega narrowed his eyes, holding down the trigger to fire the weapon while adjusting his aim.   
  
The scary thing about Charged Particle Cannons and the like were that they weren`t banned in Sanctioned Battles, but their usage was extremely restricted to aiming for the area near an enemy Zoid rather than right at it, though this rule wasn`t in place during Royal Cup Tournaments. This meant that Vega had to be careful about how he used it, which is exactly why he took his time, narrowing in as best he could to the space exactly five meters above the three Zoids.   
  
"Ready Oeny?" He asked the Zoid, which growled in reply rather than trying to use some second mind-voice. Seconds passed by as the tip of the barrel began to glow, then a rushing sphere of energy formed there, one that grew and grew, and kept on growing by the moment until it was almost as big as the Fury`s own head, only barely fitting into the space of it`s jaws.   
  
And then there the sound of a sonic boom and Kelly`s Lightning Saix went back on the attack, dodging under the Fury`s arms and slamming into it at the midsection, causing the large Zoid to tilt back at the last second as Vega released the trigger in surprise, causing a beam twice the width of the Berserk Fury itself to go streaking up into the skies in a flash of light, intense enough to shut out the light from the sun and render the entire battlefield little more than a white flare visible from miles away for several seconds before the beam narrowed to a thin ribbon of energy and stopped completely, just as the Fury bent forward again and locked both of it`s stubby arms around the head of the Saix.   
  
"Nice move," Vega complimented as steam hot enough to melt a normal vehicle into slag rushed out of the tail of the Fury, which was still straight. "Remember to try and back away afterward next time though," he advised as the tail vents of the Berserk Fury clamped shut once again.   
  
"Grand... I`m being tutored on how to fight by a kid," Kelly muttered sourly, just as Vega swung her up into the air and then dodged back, making to jump up after her for some move or another only to meet two pairs of incoming shots from Chris and Jack, halting the large Zoid in mid-air with the first two impacts and pushing it back with the second.   
  
"Alright, it looks like we`re out of options here," Chris stated, just as her Lightning Saix shifted around several times quickly, trying to shake out the slowness of what could be considered 'injuries' to the Zoid. "Agreed," Jack replied uneasily, his own Saix stumbling forward as Kelly`s shifted and landed on it`s feet to the right of her teammates.   
  
"Saix Twister then?" Kelly asked dazedly. Even if her Saix had made it to the ground in one piece, all of that twisting, turning and flying around had knocked a bit of the sense out of her. "Yeah, I`ll lead us off," Jack stated, bursting forward in a flash and swerving along towards Vega, who had only just touched down himself a few seconds before, leaving him wide open for the Berserk Fury to be swept off of it`s feet for several seconds by Jack, who stopped on a dime and swung around on a tight angle, coming back around a second time as Chris and Kelly moved up into position to join the attack, just as Vega touched back down the second time after Jack`s second pass.   
  
"**_NOW!!!_**"   
  
In a pair of sonic shockwaves, Chris and Kelly rushed in, each coming in at opposite angles, with Jack following up a few seconds later by crossing through both of their paths. The pattern continued until it had formed what looked like a nine triangles formed completely out of dust, though each dust trail promptly blew away as the shockwaves of the Saix team`s movement, with Chris and Kelly providing most of the force and Jack simply boosting their efforts by guiding the shockwaves into the Berserk Fury, which was rapidly taking on damage by the second as a result.   
  
_ "What in the hell is this?!"_ Vega thought in a blur, feeling the Zoid rock around and lose it`s footing several times before finally clamping down the foot locks in a panic, which only succeeded in leaving the Zoid a sitting duck with not enough room to execute a Charged Particle Shot while the three Saix could knowingly kept just out of range of it`s tail and head, effectively pinning the Fury in place to be slammed by shockwave after shockwave of sound, something that would eventually wear away on both the pilot and the Zoid.   
  
And that wasn`t even the worst of Vega`s problems, because there was something even more dangerous beginning to happen at the very epicenter of the attack, all around him.   
  
A tornado was beginning to form.   
  
"You`ve got to get out of there!" Katherine`s voice cut in sharply over the comm, and Vega could only grit his teeth for several seconds. "I think I kinda figured that out by now!" He yelled back, even as the Fury howled it`s war cry, which was promptly shut out by the load roar of a newly formed tornado, literally ripping up and out of the ground in a spiral, almost tearing the Zoid right out of it`s rooted spot on the ground, causing it to stubbornly bend forward and sink it`s claws in, staying put even as the fierce winds threatened to rip it out of the ground. The sonic booms weren`t exactly helping.   
  
** What do we do now?!   
  
** "I don`t know! Shut up!" Vega ordered frantically, trying in vane to think something up.   
  
_ "Thinkthinkthinkthinkthink..."_ Vega jumbled at himself, trying to clear the Fury`s panicked voice out of his mind long enough to actually come up with a plan. Before, they`d worked just fine but right now he was having quite a time thinking something up, until finally...   
  
**_ WHAT NOW?!   
  
_** "**_GET PISSED YOU BIG PIECE O` SHIT!!!_**" Vega screamed at the Zoid, his own emotions reflecting his words, even if he had to force himself to become more angry than he was afraid. It was a trick he had picked up during the initial period of time when he was playing with the Backdraft`s 'elite aces,' people he kicked around in battles for fun. Basically, he had figured out that he could further control and work with the Fury if he used his emotions to help do it, and the emotion the Zoid responded most intensely to was anger.   
  
Unlike in the Royal Cup though, Vega wasn`t going to be knocked out this time. That would keep the Fury focused with it`s anger, ruthless, precise and lethal, something it hadn`t been during the Tournament.   
  
** ... I... Hate... Them...   
  
**_ "That`s it... They think they can take us with such a pansy assed move as this?!"_ Vega goaded, feeling the Fury`s emotions shift from fear to well guided rage as the Zoid released it`s grip on the ground with it`s hands, standing up with a jerk amid the rushing winds and sonic booms. With a loud roar, audible even over the screeching howls of the winds and the tortured cries of the sound barrier being broken, the Berserk Fury stood with near impunity, practically unable to move or attack.   
  
With the Fury now angry, Vega`s mind was cleared of it`s voice, and in turn, the Zoid had become virtually unmoving. Nothing ventured, quite a bit gained, allowing the young pilot to try and think.   
  
The ground though, it wasn`t as resolved as the unlikely duo striving to cling to it, and after a few moments, the foot locks began to slip loose. The foot locks...   
  
The foot locks.   
  
_ "The foot locks!"_ Vega repeated to himself, literally smacking his own forehead before leaning forward and pulling back on the controls into the proper pattern to slip the foot locks up and out of their anchored position. "Vega! We just picked up that you`re releasing the clamps," Katherine`s voice jacked into the boy`s senses. "Just shut up and get the Storm Unit ready," Vega ordered with a sneer, just as the foot locks slung up into neutral.   
  
"This party just _ended_," Vega exclaimed loudly over the broadband, just as the Berserk Fury was literally torn off of the ground, surfing up and crashing into the inner wall of the tornado on one of the numerous sonic booms that the Lightning Team was throwing at it.   
  
"What the hell is that kid doing?!" Chris demanded, watching the Fury skim up into the walls of the tornado and fire off it`s rockets, seeming to skate alongside them. "And people wonder why I`m the former King," the boy muttered to himself annoyedly, at about the same time that the Fury literally slammed straight through the wall of the tornado, slingshotting along the outside and flying through the air towards the Hammerhead II, which looked as though it was about to bank sharply to get out of the way.   
  
"_Don`t move_!" Vega ordered. "**_What_**?! You won`t even come in on the right course!" The man formerly identified as 'Pip' yelled back. "That`s why I`m the pilot here, dunce," Vega retorted as the Fury deactivated the entire rocket set-up on one leg, hitting the afterburners on the second while swinging it`s tail towards it, causing the entire Zoid to twist around before the first leg lit back up in a burst of flames.   
  
"You were saying?" Vega asked smugly, at the same time that the Fury smacked feet-first into the launch rail, magnetics kicking in to do the rest of the job of bringing it to a stop while Vega killed the engines, breathing a deep sigh of relief and emotionally coaxing the Zoid into calming down.   
  
"... Whatever," Pip grumbled in reply while the launcher slid up and into the main body of the Hammerhead II.   
  
"Alright... Ready to initialize the Storm Armor..." Vega said with a steeled resolve, leaning forward again and shifting the controls into the appropriate pattern to trigger the selection.   
  


_ End Chapter Fifteen_  
  


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**Author`s Note:** Cliffhanger! Bwahahaha!  
  
**Shiro:** He stopped wearing his visor in NA, thus his character shielding went with it :P And I`ll try to mail ya sometime, just been a tad busy as of late.  
  
**Anonymous:** The shield generator equipment(secondary powerplants, controls, emitters, etc) had to be removed to accomodate for the placement of the Sim`s blades. They can still charge them but not very much compared to a true Blade Liger. Hope that answers your question :/  
  
That`s all for now, enjoy and leave a review! Sh33p out. 


	17. Assault of the Hurricane, The Storm Fury

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I do not own Zoids.  
  


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** New Age**  
Assault of the Hurricane - The Storm Fury   
  
  
  


Various clicks, clacks, snaps and an equal number of electric shocks sounded off in the hangar of the Hammerhead II as the Berserk Fury was turned into _just_ the Fury, the Berserk Armor being picked off by several dozen mechanical arms before the rail moved itself forward two slots, coming to a stop at the only part of the hangar that actually had a new armor system in it. Vega cracked his neck readily, steeling himself for the battle he was about to rejoin.   
  
Seconds went by as the arms of the second CAS point went to work on the Fury, moving forward with close to two dozen pieces of armor and equipment, each of which snapped into place on the Zoid perfectly, each arm carrying or helping to carry another piece of armor or equipment, and each part of the set working to form up onto the Fury`s body like some sort of puzzle.   
  
"CAS complete, ready to mobilize the Storm Fury," Katherine`s voice stated as Vega licked his lips. The emotions of the Zoid had shifted once again, from calm to a serious doseage of pride, though the pilot couldn`t really blame it. In all of a half of a minute, Vega was certain the Lightning Team would know why...   
  
  
"Damn," Jack muttered to himself, the Saix Twister finally having ended after several seconds without any of the Lightning Team Zoids to keep it going. "So the runt has transformable armor too," Chris figured in an instant. "Which means that whatever comes out of that Hammerhead II is going to be even more of a pain to try and deal with," Kelly finished with a sigh. "We`ll just have to be ready to pull another Twister on him... Either that or think something up on a fluke," Jack stated, watching as the space above the launch rail that showed the inside the carrier-type Zoid was suddenly shut out.   
  
"Here he comes," Kelly said, more to herself than the other three. Slowly, the platform lowered down from within the bowels of the Hammerhead II, and with it, came something neither the Taskers nor Jack ever expected to have to fight.   
  
A flare of magnetics, the clash of lightning between rails and it was launched, erupting into the low skies above the battlefield for the briefest of instants before slamming down on both feet with a hard skid, stopping several dozen yards from the bewildered, stressed Lightning Saix pilots. "Let`s see how well you guys do when the playing field is leveled," Vega said with a tone of threat as the Fury roared it`s challenging call to the other pilots.   
  
It was a unique irony that the Storm Fury, something so majestic as it was, was so opposite from the only thing that really compared to it in every way. It towered over the Saix Zoids at near-equal height to a Gojulas, but it was sleek, obviously made for speed. Two enormous ion boosters similar to those of the Jaeger, yet very obviously styled for the Fury, were positioned behind a pair of Geno Breakeresque claw arms, both of which added to the fierce attack capability they already had with a pair of dual-firing pulse cannons, while on the space just fore of the elbow joint on either arm, there were a pair of light gattlings like those found on the arms of the Gunsniper. The last pieces of considerable firepower were the two machine guns mounted just above either knee on the outer thigh/hip joins of the large Zoid.   
  
Yet the final irony to this was that the Storm Fury was colored orange with a black stripe running from it`s nose to it`s tail, with its guns painted black as well and it`s claws a solid silver, contrasting it perfectly with the colors of the Liger Zero Jaeger.   
  
"If none of you will start us off, then _I_ will."   
  
There was a quick bit of movement as the Storm Fury`s ion boosters slid out of their neutral position and moved to either side of the Zoid, followed by a loud scream of tortured, burning atmosphere when the boosters and the rockets in both legs ignited at full thrust, sending the large Zoid forward at a blinding pace towards the enemy team, streaking in at such a rate that only Chris and Jack managed to dodge out of the way in time, leaving Kelly`s Saix to deal with the onslaught.   
  
The first attack, it narrowly avoided, leaving behind several holograms, leaving the Fury`s jaws to slam shut around thin air. The second attack was another she narrowly avoided as well, missing the first of the two clawblades on the right shield arm by mere inches, but the third was the clencher. Kelly Tasker`s Lightning Saix screeched as the second shield arm`s clawblades locked in place around it`s body from the front, literally plowing through the right side of the double cannon mounted on it`s back like a hot knife through butter, stopping inches short of slicing through the rest of the Zoid`s right half before nonchalantly swinging it up and off of the ground.   
  
"One!" Vega announced over the broadband, flinging Kelly`s Lightning Saix aside and turning to the two remaining members of the Lightning Team.   
  
Kelly let out a scream as her Zoid slammed into the ground and rebounded back up, skidding along after corkscrewing awkwardly through the air and hitting the ground a second time. The pilot was unharmed, by some miracle of god, but the command and combat systems both had completely frozen up. Much of the right side of the Zoid`s body from the space beneath the back of it`s gunmount to it`s right shoulder threatened to tear loose easily.   
  
"**_KELLY!_**" Chris screamed, glaring back at the Storm Fury angrily. "I`ll make you pay for that," she threatened. "Don`t!" Jack yelled, though it was already too late. In a blur of movement, Chris` Saix launched itself forward at Vega, firing off several seconds and missing with each shot. Mere instants before she could crash into him though, Vega`s Zoid rocketed off of the ground in a blast of superheated ions, moving up several dozens of feet into the air above the Saix` head as it passed underneath.   
  
Shots rang out shortly afterward, coming in four streams. Two smaller ones coming from the Fury`s arm-gattlings, two larger streams coming from it`s hip-mounted machine cannons. Chris expertly dodged each of them, and in doing so left Jack with a damnably tight window of opportunity to attack, lunging his own Saix forward and crashing into the upper back of the Storm Fury at near-full speed, rebounding off and backflipping for a perfect landing before opening fire on the Zoid, which had stumbled forward a bit.   
  
The Storm Fury rocked back, six shots had hit it`s left shield arm, but it seemed unharmed aside from that, both main boosters swinging down a bit with the right veering out somewhat before igniting, sending it flying sideways at Jack. The season mercenary dodged what would have been something akin to a martial arts dropkick by rushing under the Fury but -   
  
"**_SHIT!!!_**"   
  
- he hadn`t counted on Vega`s right pair of pulse cannons, which rained down shots directly in front of him. On the other hand though -   
  
_ "Stig wasn`t kidding about new tricks..."   
  
_ - Vega hadn`t exactly been counting on Jack to make use of the Saix` holographic projector systems, swerving to the side before the boy had even pulled the trigger but using a well executed hologram to fool the former King`s eyes, and his trigger finger.   
  
"You okay, Jack?!" Chris asked with concern, rushing back in and opening fire in a precise, yet obviously rushed and slightly frantic firing pattern, grazing over the Storm Fury with three of the twelve shots fired, missing with all of the rest. "Could definately be better," Jack replied, keeping his cool and swerving around to catch Vega and the Fury off gaurd again, tagging the Zoid across it`s tail with a double impact from his guns.   
  
"I`m out!" Kelly shouted over the comm, having finally regained enough composure to actually speak. "We figured as much," Jack said, dodging to the side with a corkscrew movement in the air as Vega flashed by again, coming to a lengthy pause several hundred feet later before narrowly turning around and screaming right back towards him.   
  
Again, Jack used the holographic system, dodging to the side in a well hidden move that was precisely timed. Again, Vega slammed through the after image and continued moving, but this time he came to a stop far quicker, with the Storm Fury wheeling around like it had expected the move and coming to a stop accordingly. An instant later, Jack found himself backpedaling out of the way of incoming weaponsfire, with gattling rounds blasting potholes into the ground in front of his Lightning Saix, missing by fractions of feet each time until...   
  
"Forgetting someone?"   
  
Until Chris Tasker charged back in, slipping through the air like a shark through the water on Vega`s left. True to his injury, the response from Vega was slowed by hundredths of seconds, but the response from the Storm Fury wasn`t. "Not really," Vega replied, just as the Fury`s left claw arm swung up and blocked Chris` strike, only to tilt on impact and slide her over, right into the second pair of claws, which latched tightly around her Zoid`s mid-section, promptly clenching shut and cutting through the armor to either side of the smaller Zoid in similar fashion to how it had dealt with Kelly mere minutes earlier.   
  
"**_HELP!!!_**"   
  
"Just lose with some dignity," Vega advised with a bit of juvenile pride, taking control back from the Fury and pile driving the Saix face first into the ground with a screeching crumple of alloy and glass, leaving the pilot only barely unharmed before he threw the Zoid out of the way and turned his attentions back to the last remaining member of the Lightning Team. Jack grit his teeth.   
  
"Grand... Just... Grand..."   
  
  
Still picking pieces of glass and metal out of his light blonde hair, Bit Cloud returned to the hospital room with a visibly annoyed frown, glaring daggers over at the innocent looking Leena, who casually played it off like nothing had happened. The glass had somehow already been replaced and the room was cleaned up as if it had never happened.   
  
Bit twitched.   
  
"Vega`s well on the way to winning, and you have a phonecall," Brad informed, keeping his foot aimed towards the bed, at about the same time that Bit noticed Leena`s face had a boot mark on it. "I don`t even wanna know," he muttered before glancing over at Brad. "Good. Who called?" Bit asked. Brad gave a shrug. "Still on the line actually," he stated, tossing the phone over at the other member of the Blitz Team, who fumbled briefly before managing to get his hands on it completely, whipping around in a blur on reflex and catching Leena in the face with his palm, even as the girl savagely fought towards the phone.   
  
"Hello?" Bit asked casually.   
  
"Is this Bit Cloud?" A woman on the other end of the phone asked. "That`s the name, don`t wear it out."   
  
"Ah... Right," the woman replied dryly before continuing. "There have been some... Complications with one of your family members. Uh... Let`s see... Great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great grandmother... Did I get that right?" She asked. "Yeah, she`s old, let`s leave it at that. What`s wrong with her?" He asked. "Apparently, late last night she had a severe seizure. She recovered but she won`t leave for a medical check-up and your parents, brothers and sisters and your grandparents can`t seem to convince her, so we checked family records to see if there was anyone left and -" "And you figured I`d be a decent last resort."   
  
"Yeah," the woman answered. "You`re the only family member we haven`t tried yet. Can you come and take a shot at getting her to recieve some treatment?" She asked. "Alright... I`ll be there in four days, that`s how long it`ll take me to get from Forintown to the Wind Co-" "Sir, it may be more serious than we think."   
  
"Alright. I`ll shorten that to one day at the most, deal?"   
  
"It`ll do. Just hurry up, the rest of the family is extremely worried about this."   
  
"Yeah, no crap," Bit muttered, turning the phone off and tossing it back to Brad. "Hey Doc, I`m goin` away for a while," Bit stated. "Where to?" Steve asked suspiciously. "Home for a while, family emergency. Jamie can cover for me, and I`ll be takin` the Liger Jaeger," Bit exclaimed, already out of the door before the older Tauros could try and pry out any further information out of him.   
  
"Well, that was weird," Leena stated sarcastically. "Since when has anything normal happened to us since he came along anyway?" Brad asked with the same tone.   
  
  
Explosions rocked through the battlefield as Jack Sisco slammed the breaks as hard as he could, watching a number of energy bolts fly in front of his Lightning Saix` nose, narrowly missing by a few feet at most. A few seconds more went by and Jack found himself again dodging through a hail of gunfire, with rounds zinging past his Saix like a furious wind, narrowly missing with virtually every shot, though at least one tagged the Zoid on the right side of the head and put a crater into it`s ear.   
  
"Give it up! You can`t win now!" Vega exclaimed menacingly, swinging the clawblades back out of view and halting his ranged attacks before launching forward. The Storm Fury was incredibly fast alright, it easily exceeded the top speed of the Lightning Saix but Jack Sisco was not a man who had earned a reputation of rightly deserved fear and respect for not noticing smaller things about his opponents - like how the Storm Fury`s manueverability was only barely on par with that of the Lightning Saix when Jack pushed it to it`s limits.   
  
"You`d do well to think before you speak, _punk_," Jack stated, dodging to the side with a corkscrewing flip that had fully turned him around by the time that Vega slipped through the area the Saix had been standing in, Jack had already set himself up to catch the former King just fore of the tail, squeezing the trigger with little more than luck and a prayer going for him in the process.   
  
Unfortunately for Jack though, he hadn`t taken into account the Fury`s ability to jump, which is exactly what it did, firing off jets in the soles of it`s feet and springing up off of the ground, allowing the incoming pair of shots to fly right between it`s knees and lance out into the desert before twisting around in mid-air, skidding to a stop and coming back around at Jack.   
  
_ "Shit,"_ the former mercenary thought, crouching the Saix down and lunging forward, diving under the Fury and rolling along twice before springing back up to it`s feet. The manuever almost cost him dearly though, even a few feet to either side and he would have torn off two of his Zoid`s legs, any further up and the gun would`ve been damaged beyond usage in the battle.   
  
"Trickier than last time," Vega complimented, going into a wide angling turn before coming back around. This time, Jack stood his ground though, opening fire with a loud scream. The Storm Fury responded in kind, bringing it`s claw shielding to bear, setting both directly in front of itself while closing in. Vega was left blind, the Zoid was too, but both knew what Jack`s next move was and they were equally prepared for it, with Vega terminating power to the thrusters and the Fury slinging down both foot locks, dragging the Zoid to a complete stop, just as they anticipated Jack dodging to either side, using that foresight to send off shots from the pulse cannons before lashing out to either side with the shields like hammers.   
  
They were wrong though.   
  
Jack was coming down from above, Saix screeching out a challenge, which the Fury answered in kind, snapping it`s blades back into attack positions and swiftly shooting them both up, knocking the Saix into an awkward flip with the first impact even as a pair of shots tore into the back unit, then stabbing into the small of it`s back, narrowly avoiding the Zoid core in the process as the lower blades seized back up, slicing into the shoulders of the Saix with ease.   
  
"Good match Jack," Vega stated. "Now you can either surrender or we can do this the hard way. Take your pick," he offered, a rare show of mercy from a boy who had knowingly killed people in battles before, even if they _were_ unsanctioned at the time. Jack spent several seconds hanging upside down in the cockpit of the Saix before sighing to himself.   
  
"Alright. I surrender."   
  
** "Battle over! Battle over! The winner is... The Fury Team!"   
  
** "Congratulations," Jack stated soberly as the Fury lowered his Saix back down towards the ground, easily drawing it`s clawblades from the smaller, downed Zoid`s body and allowing it to hit the ground with a hard thud, retracting both tools blades on either shield arm back out of usage and then lowering both arms into neutral, with the Storm Fury letting out a roar of triumph seconds later.   
  
"Thanks, good luck on fixing your Zoids," Vega finally said as the Judge lifted off, while the Hammerhead II lowered down towards the ground, paused above the back unit of the Berserk Armor, a magnetic unit not unlike the kind of cranes one could find in a junkyard lowering down to scrape the piece up. It raised back up into the airship a few seconds later.   
  
"See you again sometime, kid," Jack said with a begrudging tone as the Storm Fury lumbered towards the Hammerhead II`s launch deck. "You too, oldbie," Vega said with a slight tinge of a jab in his voice.   
  
  
The once peaceful scenery of the desert several dozen miles from the Blitz Team base was erased in a fluid streak of blue trailed by a massive dustcloud and a furious pair of whitish blue fireballs to either side of said-streak. The streak let off a roar that seemed... Oddly concerned.   
  
The streak had many names over the past centuries, but now it`s name was Liger Zero. Currently that was dashed at the end with 'Jaeger' to denote it as being in possession and wear of it`s current armor, which was a striking, somewhat dark shade of blue mixed with white. The Zoid`s pilot was the youngest of five children, two brothers and two sisters. He came from a relatively humble background, a sub-par student in High School with a genius IQ and an athletic street to boot, as well as a fairly talented mechanic and salvager.   
  
His name was Bit Cloud. Right now he was in his normal clothing, a thickly stuffed backpack sat between his feet in the floor of the Zero`s cockpit, he was reclining and he had on a look of worry and concern. This was due to a key reason, because Bit Cloud hadn`t been home in close to two years, he was a nineteen year old who should have been convicted of grand theft auto for stealing his father`s garbage truck, not to mention property destruction when he converted it to a salvage truck.   
  
Then there were other things he had to deal with, such as how bad his relationship was with his family. He hadn`t seen them, just like he hadn`t seen his home, in close to two years. The only one he tended to keep in contact with was his eight times-grandmother, who should have died of old age yet had continued to live on, literally outliving every one of her descendants thus far and proving very likely outlive Bit himself given his lifestyle as a Zoid warrior, a profession where longevity wasn`t exactly gauranteed. She was the only person in his family whom he kept in contact with, phoning her at least once a month and often at least trying to send out letters.   
  
Unfortunately, something was terribly wrong and she wouldn`t listen to anybody else, so Bit Cloud was making the tough decision to head back home, simply because he gave a damn. The key mystery though, was why the Liger gave a damn. Bit didn`t know, he could probably care less, but the Zoid seemed at least equally as worried as he was, if not more so.   
  
_ "Guess we`ll find out soon, eh Liger?"_ Bit asked. The Zoid rumbled it`s answer in affirmation.   
  
The partners continued on their journey, tearing through the desert like a bat out of Hell. They were on a mission now, and they wouldn`t stop until they completed it.   
  


_ End Chapter Sixteen  
  


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**Author`s Note:** And so ends one of the most spectacular fights of the series to date. What`d everyone think of the Storm Fury?  
  
**Zinou:** Eheh... Glad someone picked up on the Yuck Fou thing >_> And yeah, Stoller seems practically made for the role of mentor to someone like Vega. It actually wouldn`t surprise me if the series ever used that idea itself. And yes, writing owns doing mail :P  
  
That`s all for now, the next two chapters are also going to focus exclusively on Bit for the most part. I figured it`s time to pay some attention to the little blonde shnitz to some extent or another, especially given what I have planned for him. It`ll also feature a special cameo from a certain someone and establish quite a bit of the backstory that I`ve left blank so far and... Well, don`t wanna spoil too much, now do I?  
  
Sh33p out folks, enjoy, leave a review and see ya next time. 


	18. Intermission, On a rainy night, two year...

  
  
**Disclaimer:** Don`t own Zoids.  
  


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**

New Age

**  
Intermission: "On a rainy night, two years ago..."   
  
  
  
Our tale begins about two years ago, no more than that, possibly a little less but either way it begins at about two years, and it begins in a most unlikely place: An amatuer boxing match taking place on a Tuesday night in a typical high school gym, located in the smalltown setting of the Wind Colony, just inside the Helic Republic`s borders. The competitors are brothers, one is named David, the other is named Bit. One of them has just graduated from college, he has a bright future ahead of him, the other is an underachieving student in high school, looking to fail his senior year. Their immediate family - including the fiance of the older brother - are among the two hundred or so people gathered that night.   
  
The bell rang, and Bit emerged from his corner with purpose in his stride. At the age of seventeen, Bit is the youngest of five children. He also looks the least like his siblings, with slightly darkish looking, naturally messy blonde hair and pale green eyes, marking him as a stark contrast to the rest of the family but the one who isn`t present. To boot, tonight, Bit has been dumped by his girlfriend of the past year and a half, making him relatively emotional compared to the calm, confident demeanor of his oldest brother.   
  
The two met at the center of the ring, smacking gloves together before starting to circle one another, Bit more calm and calculated in his anger, David more willing to expend energy by hopping around in a Muhammad Ali-like boxing strut. The two continue to circle for several steps, and then David threw his arms up and buried his face behind them as Bit lashed out, tagging three jabs into his oldest brother`s forearms, aiming upward so as to tilt David back, then using his right hand, Bit drew back and slammed into David`s lightly exposed chin, knocking the larger of the two back several steps.   
  
David rebounded off of the ropes though, confidently ducking under his youngest brother`s angered haymaker and whipping back up, smacking Bit across the side of the face with a backhanded punch.   
  
Bit faltered, and in doing so, the Gates of Hell were opened up on him. In four seconds, the youngest of the Cloud siblings was on his knees, leaned against one of the ropes after suffering two right hooks and a solid left cross, only to resiliently get back to his feet and dizzily stare at his brother`s pandering to the crowd.   
  
_ "I`ll make him eat those taunts,"_ Bit thought glaringly, lunging forward and catching David off gaurd with a sickeningly hard hitting haymaker across the right side of the oldest of the Cloud siblings` head, plowing through the air and steamrolling right into the space next to David`s left eye. The older Cloud toppled over sideways and onto the ropes, the younger staggered forward under his own force and caught himself short of falling over, just as David blindly lashed out with a backhand.   
  
Bit ducked and replied in kind, catching David solidly in the right eye with his left hand, placing every ounce of his admittedly skinny body`s weight behind the blow and knocking David right over the top rope of the ring as a result, leaving the oldest sibling to land with a disgusting crack, neck first, on the edge of the ring, tumbling further to his stomach on the padded floor around the ring. Cheers could be heard, Bit felt his arm raised in victory but he didn`t care, immediately rushing out to check on the oldest of the Cloud children instead.   
  
  
"He`s lucky he wasn`t paralyzed," the doctor stated with a dark undertone to Richard Cloud, father of five and husband to Silvia Cloud. Bit sat dimly behind them, one hand holding his head up, both eyes staring over at the doctor and his parents. The other four Cloud siblings were a room over, three trying to keep an eye on David, and David himself lying in a hospital bed with a neck cast.   
  
"How long`ll it be `til he heals?" Silvia asked. "About two to three months to take the cast off, at least a year to fully heal the injury entirely," the doctor answered. Richard glanced angrily over at his youngest son, who nonchalantly resumed staring at a nearby wall with a dim expression.   
  
"When can he leave the hospital?" Silva asked. "At least a week to make sure everything`s alright. We`ll also be moving him to another room," the doctor answered, taking the x-ray sheets back down from where he had left them, then turning back to the middle aged couple. "Would it be okay if Tanya, Talia and Larry stayed here the night with him?" Richard asked grimly. "Don`t see why not," the doctor shrugged.   
  
"Though there _is_ something you should know about," the doctor paused. "What?" Both parents asked. "David`s probably going to be blind in his right eye for the rest of his life."   
  
At this, Richard Cloud`s stance shifted immeasurably and Bit brought both hands up to his face, practically trying to hide. David was Richard`s 'favorite son,' so to speak. David was well liked, a star athlete and a great student when he was in college, and he had graduated from college at the top of his class in archaeology. Now he was going to be permanently scarred and probably wouldn`t be able to fully work as more than a museum curator for at least a half a year, and even then he probably wouldn`t be able to do any fully strenuous physical tasks like the kind required in an archaelogical dig for another six months after that without fear of making the injury recurring or worse - permanent.   
  
_ "... Why me?"_ Bit asked himself darkly, still able to feel his father`s disapproving glare even without being able to see it.   
  
  
"**_YOU GOD DAMN GOOD FOR-NOTHIN`-LOSER!_**" Richard Cloud`s angry voice echoed through the thick masonry of the Cloud family`s farmhouse, carrying even through that to be faintly audible outside. "How the hell was I supposed to know it`d happen?!" Bit demanded defiantly. "**_OH! AND JUST HOW THE HELL WERE YOU SUPPOSED TO KNOW WHICH ANSWERS NOT TO PICK ON THAT TEST?!_**" Richard demanded in return, forcibly shoving his son`s smaller frame back into his seat.   
  
Of all of the Cloud family men, Richard was the largest. At 6'4", he stood two inches taller than David, three taller than Larry and four taller than Bit, as well as a good half a foot taller than his own father. He was also the strongest, having spent his entire life as a hard working farmer. Against that, an underdeveloped, slightly skinny teen like Bit was pretty much helpless, even with his boxing skills.   
  
"David was gonna be our future you damned idiot! He was gonna take care of us when I retire, now what?" Richard questioned. "Now I`m prob`ly gonna have to work another ten years just to make up for supportin` the boy after this!" He yelled. Bit seethed in quiet. "And you, what the hell have you done for me an` your mother? **_NOTHING!_**" The older Cloud screamed, bending down into his son`s face. "You`ve done nothing from day one but be a total **_FAILURE_**, you can`t farm, you can barely box, your little whore of a girlfriend left ya for a _real_ man on the football team and you can barely even _drive_ at the age o` seventeen!"   
  
"If I`m such a failure at boxing, why is Dave in the hospital?"   
  
"**_BECAUSE YOU SCREWED UP!!!_**" Richard screamed, smacking Bit harshly across the cheek and knocking the teen right off of the couch. Bit only grit his teeth and slowly got up on all fours, only to find his father`s boot ground into the small of his back. "_**COME ON BOY, WHERE`S ALL THAT STRENGTH YA HAD EARLIER?! HITTIN` YOUR OWN GOD DAMN BROTHER WHEN HE`S DOWN!**_" A stomp and Bit yelped in pain before rolling out of the way, right into a kick in the gut.   
  
"You`re god damned useless, even Larry`s more of a good son than you and he`s been arrested three times for vandalism!" Richard emphasised his actions with another kick, causing Bit to yelp again and start choking. It was a wonder the teen wasn`t sobbing given that his father made it a point to always wear steel combat boots no matter what the event.   
  
"Shit, your _sisters_ are more hard workin` than you and they both get better grades! What the hell kinda son are you, anyway?!" Bit merely hacked up a bit of blood onto his chin in response and started clawing his way back up to his knees and leaning most of his weight against the couch with a wheeze.   
  
"Aw, what`s wrong boy? Can`t get up like ya did earlier? Thought you`d be used to beatings by now with the way ya let the jocks at school beat ya `round," David growled, even though Bit replied in kind by getting back up to his feet completely and gritting his teeth together. "Shut up," Bit ordered angrily. "**_DON`T YOU EVER ORDER ME AROUND YOU LITTLE BASTARD!_**" Richard screamed, lashing out at his youngest son. Bit was ready though, throwing an uppercut right into his father`s fist with reflexes that seemed inhuman, then catching Richard off gaurd completely with a vicious right hook into the cheek, throwing the middle aged farmer down onto a nearby coffee table, snapping it in half instantly.   
  
"**_GET THE HELL OUT! YOU AIN`T NO SON O` MINE!!!_**" Richard screamed. "**_NO PROBLEM THERE!_**" Bit replied angrily, storming past the nearest chair and kicking the door open in a rage, stomping out and walking off into the night without another word.   
  
"Bit! Don`t you dare leave!" Silvia yelled, but Bit didn`t hear her. Even if he did, he wouldn`t have cared.   
  
  
Tom Cloud`s house. Three miles west of the Cloud family farm, it was where the younger of the two older Cloud men lived. Tom was Bit`s uncle, furthermore, Tom wasn`t very conventional in his own right.   
  
Not that Bit cared right now. Bruises were forming beneath the make of his tattered black t-shirt, his sneakers were dirtied from stomping through cold mud and he had been drenched by rain, but Bit didn`t care. All he was here for was one thing, and he knew Uncle Tom wasn`t going to like that, but it was okay either way. He`d just find a way to repay him sometime in the future.   
  
Hopping over a three foot deep ditch and continuing on in a straight line to the door of Tom`s garage, arriving in a matter of seconds and stopping dead in his tracks. The youngest Cloud son paused long enough to wipe his matted, drenched hair out of his eyes, then bent down and squirmed his fingers under the door`s bottom edge, yanking it hard several times before prying it up and open after several seconds, giving the garage door one last tug and literally throwing it open all of the way before stepping inside, right up to his uncle`s garbage truck.   
  
What followed next qualified Bit as being guilty of grand theft auto and property damage. Again, he didn`t care. He`d pay it off someday so it didn`t matter to him.   
  
The blonde teen drew his arm back and slammed his elbow into the glass of the passenger`s window, shattering it instantly and giving him several cuts before he flipped the switch that unlocked all of the doors. Stepping around to the driver`s side, he cleared off the seat and ignored the bleeding on his arm, prying open the space beneath the wheel and going to work trying to hotwire the truck.   
  
It took him close to twelve minutes but he did it, climbing inside and slamming the door shut before pressing his foot into the gas pedal and sending the truck smashing into the wall behind it since Bit hadn`t switched it out of reverse, which was what he did following that an instant later. Again, he pressed the pedal down and this time...   
  
This time the truck slid out of the garage with the roar of it`s engine to sound through the night, dashing down the driveway and turning hard down the road before vanishing into the darkness of the evening.   
  
  
He had never intended to come back after that. Sure, he still intended to repay his uncle, but money could easily be mailed or sent through services like Helic West.   
  
But now, he _was_ coming back, and he was coming back for a good reason. Keeping his gaze narrowed and straight ahead, Bit watched as the edge of the Wind Colony`s town borders came into view, even as the Jaeger flashed by the first road sign signaling it at such a speed that it literally ripped the upper half of the sign off from the backdraft and then set it ablaze in the exhaust trail. The Zoid let out a roar and began to slow down, but Bit still didn`t care very much.   
  
The Zoid continued to slow down, and over the course of seven minutes, the exhaust trail faded away, the dust cloud that had been visible from a half a mile away came to a stop and the early morning sun slipped up into view in the distance behind it, heralding the Zero`s arrival, and perhaps it`s return as well. Only it knew anymore, it and one other anyway.   
  
There was no reception as the Zoid padded along blithely through the exceptionally wide main road of the town, ion boosters tucked securely out of the way as the Zoid stopped at a red light, leering from side to side as if in familiarity.   
  
"Just like old times," Bit thought, unknowingly echoing the thoughts of the Liger, which continued onward to the opposite edge of town, stopping at the sight of a long dirt road. "Yeah, it`s this one. Granny`s house is about four miles down the road but you`ll have to be careful to avoid the old man`s crops," Bit advised, not wanting to pilot right now. The Zoid nodded slowly in understanding and then began to plod down the narrow road as if it were a tight rope, continuing on until...   
  
Until it stopped at a clear track of land surrounded by a fertile, ripe looking set of well kept farmland. The front porch of the house at it`s center was slightly crowded though, eight adults and two toddlers eating breakfast while a little boy with striking black hair ran around in the front yard. None of them but the boy seemed to notice as the Liger came to a stop, cockpit flipping open without a sound.   
  
Bit stood up and glanced down at the boy, who met his eyes with a look of terrified wonder, the kind only a child could have.   
  
"Who`re you?!" The boy called up, still unnoticed by the adults, who had yet to notice the Liger either.   
  
"I`m Bit Cloud! Granny here?" Bit announced, ignoring the way that every adult sprang to attention at the mention of his name. "Ohhh! Uncle Bit!" The boy yelled in surprise. "That the Liger Zero?!" He asked. "Yep! Granny here?!" Bit yelled back, ignoring the fact that the rest of the family present was starting to crowd off of the porch towards he and the Jaeger. "Which one?"   
  
"The real friggin` old one! Lives about a mile that way," Bit indicated, pointing past his parents` house towards a small speck in the distance. "Oh! No, she`s at home I think!" The boy replied. "Thanks! Think you could move? Liger`s nice and all but I don`t want to cause any accidents!" Bit advised, watching the kid give a few fevered nods before dashing out of the way, and just in time at that.   
  
The youngest of Rick and Silvia`s kids dropped back into the cockpit with something of a hurry, watching his surroundings slide shut a few seconds later before the Zero continued on, no longer confining Bit with a safety harness since there really wasn`t much of a chance that he`d need it. The Zoid padded along past the yelled greetings of the family as if it hadn`t heard them, though even if it did, Bit didn`t care.   
  
Farther and farther, the Zoid and it`s pilot distanced themselves from a family Bit hadn`t spoken to in two years, and a family he didn`t care to speak to again any time soon. Thanks to his infamous luck of the draw, they didn`t. They all stopped and stared as if in shock as the Zoid nonchalantly walked around the house and continued on, moving down the thin road as if on a tight rope once again.   
  
Several minutes later though, it dropped this stance completely at the sight of a familiar little domed house set atop a pleasant little hill, the porch shaded by an equally pleasant looking oak tree, the branches grown out in just the right pattern to cover the porch from sunlight during mid-day, but on it...   
  
On it sat the oldest member of the Cloud family, perhaps also the oldest living person on Zi. The Liger roared in recognition at the sight of her, and the cockpit slipped open for Bit to jump out, covering the distance to the ground and landing perfectly without much notice of the 30+ foot drop he had just performed, walking forward with a small smirk at the sight of the old woman rocking back and forth on her favorite chair on the porch.   
  
Her hair was white as snow, styled in a strangely unique sort of way, and her eyes had yet to lose their pinkish, pupil-less appearance even after nine generations, roughly 235 years since a boy had woken her up in the desert ruins that had been grown over by a forest over the centuries. Even in her enormously old age, the woman was still obviously beautiful, one could see the outlines of the blonde haired, fiery eyed young woman she had once been. Time seemed almost afraid of her, for despite being around 246 years in actual physical age, she didn`t look a day over the age of sixty-five.   
  
And then there was that simply friendly little smile she had, the one she gave Bit as he started to walk up the side of the hill, Liger not more than a step behind at the most. It was the kind of smile that could turn the angriest of enemies into the greatest of friends, the kind that could tempt one into spilling their life`s story in an instant. Her aged appearance was topped off by the loose fitting pink dress the old woman wore, and the two teal colored marks tattooed just above the bridge of her nose, between the spaces above either eyebrow.   
  
Fiona Alysse Lenette-Fleiheit stood up and waved over at her descendant before rounding the railing of the porch and walking down to greet him with a familiar hug.   
  
Bit Cloud was home again, for the first time in close to two years, and he actually cared enough to smile and hug her back in reply.   
  


_ End Chapter Seventeen  
  


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**Author`s Note:** Now who in the hell saw THAT comin`? Also: For some reason I could see Bit being a chronic underachiever from a very loaded household. The issues with his father never turned abusive until the time portrayed here, aside from that it was just arguements but this one time it became physical and both were fed up with it. All the Clouds here aside from Bit are OCs, and yes, Silvia Cloud is a bit of a name pun(Silver Cloud).  
  
**Shiro:** Well, I`m a sixteen(almost seventeen) year old guy with brown eyes and light brown hair. That kinda makes it impossible for me to be 246 year old, pinkish red eyed, white haired Fiona, doesn`t it? :P  
  
And are the cameos done? Nope, I got one more left, though it probably won`t come at the same level of surprise as this one here. And to answer a question before it can be asked: Yes. I **do** think Fiona would live that long, if not longer. She and Bit have different names since Bit is descended from one of her granddaughters rather than a grandson. Hope that explains that for ya.  
  
That`s all for now. Enjoy, leave a review and see ya next time! Sh33p out. 


	19. Revelations and Connections, A Dark Clou...

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I do not own Zoids.

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** New Age**  
Revelations and Connections - A Dark Cloud on the Horizon   
  


A sunny morning on the side of a hill where a plain little domed house next to a pleasant oak tree. A sunny, warm morning accented by not one, but - strangely and possibly unbelievably enough - _two_ very special reunions. The first, most important reunion of them was the reunion between Fiona Alysse Lenette-Fleiheit and her great, great, great, great, great, great, great, grandson, Bit Cloud. This was because Fiona had been the one relative, however distant they were in terms of actual genetics given that the woman was his _living_ ancestor, that Bit had ever truly gotten along with. Sure, he and Larry had caused a good bit of chaos but that was different, with Fiona it felt like Bit had a friend who simply doubled as actual family, a mentor of some sort.   
  
Fiona was also the only person who believed him when he said he heard strange things around Zoids as a kid, mainly since she claimed to have quite a few odd powers herself. That made this first reunion special to both of them, but the second reunion was a good deal stranger as Fiona eased out of the hug and glanced up at the enormous Zoid standing on the side of the hill she called a front yard.   
  
"Nice to see you again, Zeke!" She called out with a pleasant wave. The Zoid rumbled what seemed like strangely non-Ligeresque sound in response, pawing at the side of its face in a way before leaning down and actually nuzzling - yes, _nuzzling_ the tip of its nose against Fionas upper body in general. And the woman seemed as if the Zoid was little more than a lap dog that was too big to share a seat with anymore, wrapping her old arms around its nose as best she could and laughing briefly in surprise when it lifted her up by accident.   
  
"Zeke?" Bit asked surprisedly when the Zoid set her back to her feet. "Oh, thats right... Zeke, didnt you tell him?" Fiona asked scoldingly. The Zoid backed up a step and lowered its head. "Now what would Van think of that, hm?" She asked. The Zoid rumbled something that Bit comprehended as an apology and then settled down onto its stomach. "Good boy," Fiona exclaimed, patting the Liger on the nose and glancing at Bit. "Is that so?" She asked, which the Zero nodded lightly to in response. "Well, well just have to fix that, now wont we?"   
  
Bit blinked several times.   
  
"What in the hell are you two talking about?" He asked dryly.   
  
"Ah, Bit... Youve been ignoring it, havent you?" Fiona asked disappointedly. "... It wasnt real, it was just my imagination damn it," Bit grumbled. "Then why is it you hear old Zeke here in youre sleep?" Fiona asked knowingly. "Let alone the fact you actually talk to him... Feel shades of his pain, feel his emotions..."   
  
"... How the heck did you know that?" Bit asked. "Only the Doc, Brad, Jamie and Leena know that... Leon probably does too but..."   
  
"But what? I know these things Bit, Ive been through them before too, you know," Fiona stated. "But everyone always said that was just you bein eccentric," Bit countered. "And I believe them," he added dryly. "Thats the flaw with people nowadays, they dont listen to the Zoids like they used to," she replied whistfully. "You just need to stop believing what theyre telling you. Come on, lets go for a walk," she ordered, turning away to head for the small orchard she kept behind her home. Bit stared after her dumbfoundedly.   
  
"But I came to make sure you didnt need to go to a hospital..."   
  
Bit let out a yelp and flew forward at the feeling of Liger giving him what it considered to be a mere nudge, but what Bit found as the equivelent of getting launched out from a catapult, sending the young man flying forward to land in front of Fiona in a complete mess of limbs, with at least his right arm placed in a location his anatomy had never meant for it.   
  
Fiona on the other hand was completely unphased, simply striding along past the youth as he sprang back up furiously, glaring at the Zoid that had seemingly 'woken up' a few minutes earlier. "What was that for?!"   
  
"Zeke really isnt a patient one anymore, I think that leeched out of him a long time ago," Fiona stated, pausing and turning over her shoulder to glance at the annoyed young man behind her. "You coming?" She asked. In response, the Liger started to slowly pad forward, stopping at Fionas annoyed look. "No Zeke, youll crumple my orchard now," she stated. "Why do you keep calling him Zeke? And why is it you seem so well if you had a dang seizure two days ago?" Bit asked annoyedly.   
  
"Youd know that if you opened your mind. Ill tell you when we get to the orchard, now are you going to be a good grandson or are you going to act like David or Tanya and sit around asking me questions all day without getting anything done?" Fiona asked with the faintest tinge of a smile. "Get anything done?" Bit asked sardonically. "Help an old lady out," Fiona ordered.   
  
The two went from there, leaving the Liger Zero to settle down and make itself at home like an oversized house cat on a porch, though this one just happened to take up the entire scale of the front section of the hill that Fionas house resided on. Rounding the reasonably small structure, the pair wound up smack dab in the middle of an orchard of sorts, though it was a little unconventional. Normally, orchards were filled with oranges or even apples, things like that, but the orchard that Fiona Alysse Linette-Fleiheit kept was something of a bittersweet reminder of a man who had lived over two hundred years earlier.   
  
Papaya plants grew in this orchard, and this year they were just about perfect for the picking. Bits mouth unconciously watered at the sight of them but Fiona idly smacked his hand away before he could try and swipe one. "They arent ready yet," she said with a hint of a stern tone to her voice. "Which means Im off the hook," Bit grinned. "Id send you a few if youd stop switching addresses so often," Fiona sighed.   
  
"Oh, Ive got a permanent one now," Bit stated. "But that can wait until weve settled a few things," he promptly added, at which his oldest relative let out a sigh. "The seizure was caused by something which Im sure you wouldve if you were less blocked off to the possibilities of your heritage," Fiona explained dryly. "If youre going into another 'ancient Zoidian' rant - dont," Bit muttered. "Bit, Bit, Bit... Its part of who you are, regardless of whether you want to admit it. Just accept it and move on."   
  
"How do I access it then?" Bit scoffed. "The same way you did when you were a frightened little boy with a phobia towards Zoids in general," Fiona explained. "... I forgot how," Bit muttered.   
  
Fiona merely shrugged and placed a hand onto the youths shoulder, giving a familiar, encouraging squeeze and a few pats before speaking again as they walked onward. "Do you know how you can feel Zekes emotions? Echoes of his pain and see shades of his personality in your dreams?" Fiona asked, knowing what Bit was going through by heart rather than having ever heard it from Bit himself.   
  
"Yeah..."   
  
"You do that not with your mind, but your heart. Open up and listen closely."   
  
Bit gave a nod and concentrated. He didnt have a clue what he was doing other than how he could sometimes coax the Liger around with his emotions, but apparently -   
  
_ About damn time.   
  
_ - it was good enough. Bit let out a yelp and glanced around in shock at the voice he had registered as coming from everywhere and nowhere at the same time, something intangible and yet all too real at the same time. The voice held an obvious mechanical ring to it, and it was deep, like a lion or a tiger - or both at once. At the same time as that, it was also human, and it was also his own.   
  
"I take it you heard it then?" Fiona asked with a humorful little smile at the sight of her distant grandsons shocked expression. He looked as though someone had just exploded out of the toilet right in front of him before he could flush it. "That... Was the Liger?"   
  
_ Zeke, please. I dont mind the whole 'Liger Zero' thing but come on, man...   
  
_ "Eeeee... This is a bit much..."   
  
"Dont be too hard on him Zeke, he hasnt exactly been influenced very well, you know," Fiona warned sternly.   
  
_ Alright. At least now hell actually **listen** to me.   
  
_ There wasnt another sound from that strange voice, and Bit simply stared at Fiona with a mortified look of shock still on his face. "H-ho-how the hell?" He asked with a stutter. "It takes some getting used to, I know. Van wouldve probably had the same reaction if he had to deal with Zeke being fused into the Liger the first time he met it too," Fiona replied with a shrug. "Come on inside and we can talk some more."   
  
And so the day passed by as Bit and Fiona spoke, and they spoke of a good many things, catching up on events that had passed by over the course of the past two years, from Bits new niece and nephew, how David had begun to truthfully forge ahead as one of the best archaeologists on the continent, how Larry had finally grown up and taken over the farm, how Tanya had survived college to become a psychologist and how Talia had decided to move into a career in politics after having tried the stay-at-home mom option and finding it not her liking by a long shot.   
  
They even talked about Bits parents, though that part of the lengthy conversation was cut short due to Bits insistence on speaking of someone else. Invariably though, the conversation between them - both now sitting on the porch - lead to something else, namely the future. And that meant...   
  
"So Bit, anyone special in your life I should know about now?" Fiona asked with a bit of a smirk. "Not really," Bit shrugged. "Really now?" Fiona asked, quirking up a brow. "Really," Bit answered with another shrug. "Oh come on Bit, youre a handsome young man and a Zoid warrior to boot... Theres gotta be _someone_," Fiona chided, just as the Liger rumbled something out.   
  
"Oh, so there is one, hm?"   
  
"Shes too young and shes a murderous psychopath," Bit stated bluntly, obviously putting in a reference to one Leena Tauros. Fiona chuckled lazily before craning her head back in her seat and crossing her arms over her lap. "Yes, that isnt your type, eh?"   
  
"Im honestly happy to be single. All I have to live for is the chase, the chance to be the best..."   
  
"Van was like that too, you know... Always rushing off for a battle, always training or fighting..."   
  
"Sounds like Idve gotten along great with him," Bit commented with a smirk. Fiona only whistfully shook her head. "Oh you might... Except during those dark days when the Death Stinger was loose..."   
  
"Yeah, you told me about that," Bit replied dryly. "Yeah... He was especially hard on himself just before and during those days. Him and Irvine both. Thomas too," she said as an after thought. "Heh... Wasnt there something between you and him?" Bit asked, shifting the subject a bit. "From his eyes, yes. Thomas was smitten with me up until the day he died, to the extent that he overcame even personal contempt for Van, even going so far as to buy us this house when he finally hit it big and created a mass producable version of the Beke unit," Fiona explained. "Didnt he do something else?"   
  
Fiona only smiled at the comment. "Yes. When Van died, Thomas footed the bill for the funeral and helped me look after Van and Is son, Dan," she stated. "Nice guy," Bit admitted before taking a sip of his orange juice. "Yeah. Shame he never settled down with anyone though, wouldve made a girl feel like a queen Id bet."   
  
"Why didnt you fall for him then?"   
  
"My heart belonged to someone else from day one. It still does," Fiona claimed, standing up straight and dusting off the seat of her dress. "But enough about that, you came here to see me about my seizure, didnt you?" She asked. Bit gave a nod and sprang up himself, chugging down the rest of his juice and setting it down before expectantly awaiting an answer. Fiona merely leaned sideways onto the rail and frowned before straightening again. "Come on Bit," she ordered, heading for the door inside with the youngest adult Cloud in tow.   
  
"Dark times are ahead Bit. Im certain that the next time I have a seizure, youll see what I see as well. Maybe not with the same clarity but youll see it," Fiona stated, heading for the stairs that lead to the second floor of the meagerly furnished house, only to stop there and lean forward, feeling around almost blindly on the seventh steps front before giving it a solid nudge and twist with her hand.   
  
"What do you mean?" Bit asked, unable to see what his living ancestor was going for. "Im perfectly healthy still, Bit, the seizure was mentally induced. The product of a nightmare, I guess you could say, and that nightmare is going to become a reality soon."   
  
Bit stared dumbfounded.   
  
"Which is why Im sure that Van would have wanted anyone Zeke picked as his successor to have this," she exclaimed, finally drawing her hand out of the compartment under the step and standing straight, revealing what looked like a gun holster attachable to a belt with a strange looking bladed weapon placed inside.   
  
"Van Fleiheits handleblade," Fiona explained simply, unbuttoning the top of the holster and drawing the centuries-old weapon from its sheath for the first time. It looked like a sword that had been bent out of shape in the loose pattern of a Z, a sharpened point at the blades tip, the blade itself also still sharp after over two hundred years and the small protrusion from the handle still perfectly formed. "The same weapon that snapped the swords of five Imperial captains."   
  
"Why would I need that though? Ive got the Liger..."   
  
_ The names **Zeke**.   
  
_ "Zeke," Bit corrected himself sardonically. "Because he wont always be there for you Bit. Besides, its about time I handed this off to _somebody_," Fiona said with a wry smile. "Youll find it very useful in a pinch someday Bit, and that someday is going to be sooner than you think and sooner than I hope."   
  
Bit gave a mere nod before taking the weapon and the holster in hand, staring at it for several seconds and shrugged, somehow cramming it into his jackets front right lower pocket and then stepping back. "I guess I should be going then... The guys probably need me pretty bad by now," Bit said with a hint of a thoughtful tone.   
  
"Alright. Call me sometime, alright? You make an old woman worried, ya know," Fiona ordered sternly, walking the young man to the door and seeing him out with a half hug and a kiss on the cheek, giving a fond wave to the youth as he made his way off of the porch. Bit hesitated though, waiting for Fiona to go back inside before glancing off into the early evening light.   
  
All in all, it had been a good day. A day that passed by a bit too quickly, but a good day nonetheless. Scratching the back of his blonde haired head for a few seconds, the youngest of the Cloud siblings began to move forward again, spotting that Zeke was waiting for him at the foot of the hill, and then spotting a sizable figure standing in front of it.   
  
Bit Cloud greeted his father for the first time in two years with an iced over glare, halting only long enough to make eye contact. The older of the two winced lightly under his youngest sons penetrating gaze and stepped aside without a word, watching Bit walk towards the Liger.   
  
"I was wrong," Richard stated finally, once Bit had made it to the Zoids head, just as the cockpit flipped open. Bit paused though, he didnt get inside. Instead, he turned around and expectantly glanced at his father with a look bordering on a mixture of outright contempt and bone chilling neutrality. "I always was... You... Youve grown into a fine young man, Bit. I-"   
  
"Go fuck yourself, Pops. You arent a part of me anymore, none of you are but Granny Fiona. Have a nice life," Bit ordered, climbing into the cockpit of the Liger at the mortified expression on Richard Clouds usually stern face, not even giving the older of the two the chance to see his own face for any longer than it took the cockpit to finish sliding shut. The Zoid stood with a rumble of gears and stabilizers, briefly seeming to pause and regard the large man who had just been so brutally chopped down by the son he had never thought would amount to anything, and the son who had wound up becoming an international celebrity just to spite him.   
  
"Come on Zeke, lets go home," Bit ordered, not a hint of satisfaction or disappointment in his voice, just cold neutrality.   
  
The Liger Zero Jaeger slowly turned to take the long way so that it could go around the farm and the town it sat next to, and then the boosters shot to life with a blast of heated air that threw Richard off of his feet even from the distance he stood away from the two. In a vengeful blue streak, the Liger took off into the early night...   
  
And wasnt seen again.   
  


_ End Chapter Eighteen  
  
_

* * *

**Authors Note:** Well, so ends our look into the homelife of one Bit Cloud. Back to business as usual with the next chapter, save for the fact it, and probably the few afterward, wont really feature much of a showing from Bit.  
  
And _no_ this is not a B/L. Zeke was merely trying to annoy Bit a little.  
  
**EndlessAdventure:** Dang :P Here I was hoping itd be a surprise. Guess the age thing gave it away.  
  
**ZeonReborn:** I think that answered questions 1 and 3, eh? Fiona HAS told the family but unfortunately, no one believes her despite the fact that she can back up her claims. Blame historical ignorance and a few other factors(it does sound rather FANTASTIC to hear such a thing, plus shes around 245 years old, you kinda figure people lose it around then if they live that long...). As for Arihmanes... Im not through with him yet. Heh heh...  
  
Thats all for now, Sh33p out! Enjoy, leave a review and see ya next time! 


	20. Broken Mirrors

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I do not own Zoids.  
  


* * *

  
  


**New Age**   
Broken Mirrors   
  
  


  
_"What now?"_ The Wild Eagle asked dryly at the sight of the information on the laptop`s monitor. _"We kiss our winning streak good-bye. Again,"_ Jamie replied with darkly intended sarcasm. "What`s the verdict?" Brad asked knowingly, leaning back in his chair and lazily regarding the teen seated across the table in the hospital room. It hadn`t even been an hour since Bit had left and things were already starting to go to pieces, it seemed. "We`re screwed?" Jamie asked cynically. _"You really need to learn what the word 'confidence' means, yanno that?"_ The Wild Eagles questioned.   
  
_ "Just shut up or I`ll start plucking feathers,"_ Jamie threatened, second nature to the extent that he actually spoke different words than he thought without the slightest bit of strain coming through. "In other words you think we`d need Bit to win," Brad deduced in a second or so flat. "Pretty much."   
  
"Who are the opponents?" Steven asked, cutting into the conversation rather flatly. "The Thunder Team and the Mercer Team," Jamie grumbled in reply. "Grand," Brad replied with a tone so sarcastic that it was even a surprise to himself.   
  
"Who`re they?" Leena asked, sitting on the edge of her bad and eating lunch with her father. "The Mercers are the premier husband-and-wife team, they use different Zoids and different styles that back each other up perfectly. The Thunder Team is an up and coming group on par with the Blitz as far as I`m concerned. Their leader is a guy piloting a blue Genosaurer that can switch it`s entire arsenal around at a moment`s notice. They`ve also got a modified Gunsniper dubbed the Spike Sniper on their team, and a souped up Command Wolf..."   
  
"And their aerial Zoid?"   
  
"... Goody. An Assault-class Griffin."   
  
"In other words we`re both dealing with a three-on-one against enemies who will probably be working in concert with each other," Brad surmised tiredly, reaching up and rubbing the spot between his eyes. "Shame that Leon and Naomi aren`t Class S, we could probably 'borrow them' from the Fluegel Team with enough persuasion," Steve thought aloud, grinding his teeth together annoyedly.   
  
"Do you know the capabilities of the enemy Zoids?" Brad asked, tabling his own feelings for the time being. Jamie gave a nod. "Tom Mercer uses a Pterasniper equipped with a variation on the long range rifle of the Gunsniper, so he usually hangs back and lets his wife, Samantha, do the point blank dirty work in a modified Stormsworder that offers incredible speed and strengthened cutting blades but leaves her with only her machine guns for ranged attacks. Neither of them use missiles though, they`re good enough to actually not need them," Jamie stated with a slight twitch.   
  
_ "Feh! I`ll show those sappy bastards who **really** rules the skies!"_ The Wild Eagle exclaimed angrily, and Jamie could almost visualize the alter ego shaking it`s fist in testament of it. "The Griffin is basically unmodified, think of a Shield Liger without the shield, then pop two gattling guns, a back mounted beam cannon turret and four sixteen shot missile launchers. It also has a pair of machine guns on it`s tail, and it`s speed isn`t too bad either..."   
  
"Now we know what you`re up against, what about the others?" Brad asked.   
  
"You`re screwed. That good enough?" Jamie asked in reply.   
  
"I`d at least like to see what`s screwing me, ya know," Brad shot back. Jamie relented with a sigh. "For starters, you`ll be dealing with a blue Genosaurer. It`s not quite as agile or fast as Kale`s but it`s definately more heavily armed, two beam cannons on the nose and two eight shot rocket boxes on the hips, plus the dual barreled cannon on the back - which _can_ pivot, unlike Kale`s."   
  
"... Wonderful..."   
  
"Then there`s the Spike Sniper... Which is basically a Gunsniper created for melee battle. It`s hands have been replaced with grappling/stabbing claws that can shoot out on tow cables to be dragged back in, it`s tail has three rows of spikes in addition to a toughened up version of it`s sniper rifle and it has a rotating gattling gun on it`s groin instead of a plain machine gun. It also has three stabbing spikes on it`s head and it`s armor`s been toughened up dramatically."   
  
"... _Spiffy_..."   
  
"And the Command Wolf is almost barebones, except that it`s got a triple shot impact cannon on it`s chest and it`s packing a long range rifle and two machine guns on it`s back like your old Wolf did," Jamie finished with a bland expression.   
  
"... My heart is singing with joy," Brad muttered with another surge of unbelievable sarcasm. "So how do you think we`ll squeak through this one?" The former mercenary asked. "I seriously doubt that we will," Jamie replied darkly, turning his eyes back to the monitor. "Our only real chance is if Griffin pilot decides to focus more on the Mercers and they try to focus more on the Thunder Team," Jamie stated.   
  
"In other words..."   
  
"Yes."   
  
"We`re screwed."   
  
"Pretty much."   
  
  
"So all we _really_ have to worry about from the Blitz Team is an A-level Raynos with a schizophrenic pilot," Samantha thought aloud, obviously amused. "Right, but the Griffin from the Thunder Team will be a royal pain to deal with... It`s probably packing the whole load if it really _is_ an assault type," Tom replied, cutting into his wife`s show of bravado with a well timed bit of common sense. "No big deal, I can gut that sucker like a fish," Samantha shot back.   
  
"Maybe but the Raynos is also capable of Lightning Saix-style sonic shockwave attacks, and it can burst-accelerate and break on a dime if it has to, at least as well as your Stormsworder," Tom stated, utterly unphased by Samantha`s severe lack of confidence in enemies. That was her one failing, he thought. She underestimated every aerial Zoid pilot around, even to the extent that she could knock off the original Wild Eagle if given the chance.   
  
"Oh, this is interesting..."   
  
"What?" Sam asked, leering over from the controls of the pair`s Gustav to put a quick eye on Tom`s face. He was again unphased. That was probably the first reason the two had been attracted to one another, so few men could deal with a woman like Samantha and not even notice her ego - let alone her looks for that matter - and so few women could stand to be with someone as dedicated as Tom.   
  
"Remember how you said you could trash the Wild Eagle?" Tom asked with a smirk. "Yeah?" Samantha asked curiously, leaning forward and then arching a brow right up into her forehead. "Who the heck is that?" She asked at the picture of a teenaged male, no older than fifteen or sixteen at best. Her husband`s reply shocked quite a bit of overconfident mirth out of his wife`s eyes though.   
  
"That, Sam, is Jamie Hameros. The son of the last Wild Eagle, and current holder of the name and title."   
  
Samantha grinned that same grin that had precursed the emergency crash landings of dozens of unfortunate Zoid pilots. Things were becoming rather interesting now...   
  
  
"In other words our only enemy on the ground is going to be a dope in a dinkier-than-Laura`s-ass Scout Fox," Jeffrey Halsworth stated. "Seems that way," the leader of the team replied, a black haired young man with brownish-blue eyes by the name of Bill Chapman. "My ass is _not_ dinky," Laura Tendro grumbled. "Nobody cares, when`s the battle slated to begin?" Bram Hunt cut into things with a lazy tone.   
  
"In about fifty minutes," Sloan replied, still sitting at the controls for the Thunder Team`s red-and-black HoverCargo.   
  
"Dibs on the Scout Fox," Bram proclaimed dryly. "No way! You honestly think we`re gonna let you have _all_ the points from this one?" Bill asked sardonically. "Better me than to waste it on you and that damn Organoid," Bram shot back. "It is _**NOT**_ a waste!" Bill yelled. "Waste, waste, waste," Bram retorted, completely unphased at his teammate`s comment. "We`ll see who`s a waste," Bill grumbled. "I`m the one who got us into Class S in the first place after all... While you were busy getting your ass kicked by a freaking Iron Kong," the black haired teen reminded the former mercenary.   
  
"I was only getting my ass kicked because you were too busy trying to give your pet a therapy lesson," Bram shot back.   
  
"Enough already," Sloan Tendro cut in. "Save the witty comments and the annoyance for your opponents," he ordered, watching as Bram nonchalantly continued egging Bill on as if he hadn`t even heard the former engineer`s words. "Kids," Jeff muttered. "You _would_ be one to talk," Laura retorted, chopping down the fifteen year old`s attempt at confidence with one witty shot.   
  
"You`re only a year older than me, yanno... If that," Jeff grumbled. "A year is old enough," Laura replied, gingerly pressing her elbow into the short teen`s scalp and leaning like it was an armrest. For all of the annoyance it caused, Jeff merely grit his teeth and stood there.   
  
  
"So the Blitz Team is having a match today too?" Vega asked with audible amusement as he slipped out of his vest and glanced around the bridge of the Hammerhead II. Having received no answer though, the boy`s thoughts soon turned inward, though his legs continued moving, carrying him over to a spare passenger`s seat just a small distance behind that 'Pip' fellow, where he promptly sat himself down and crossed his arms over his stomach, leaning forward.   
  
** ... Do not forget.   
  
** _"I won`t,"_ Vega sighed in thought, a little disgruntled that the Zoid was unwilling to let him enjoy himself after a battle given how dedicated things had become over the past days. Kale was still out there, after all, and Vega was going to have to be ready for him in their next encounter - and there **_would be_** another battle between the two, Vega was as certain of it as he was certain that he needed air to breathe. _"There any way you can uh... 'Listen in' on the Blitz Team`s battle?"_ Vega asked.   
  
** I can try, but what`s the point?   
  
**_ "Good to see what our primary competition can do when we make it in,"_ Vega answered.   
  
** Indeed.   
  
** Vega distantly registered what felt like something akin to strain, maybe the telepathic equivelent of a grunt or two, and then what seemed to him like a few muttered curses before finally...   
  
**"**_As you can see, Tod, the teams are already arriving and it seems as though Bit Cloud has gone missing from the Blitz Team! What impact will this have on the battle? And where did the Royal Cup Champion go?_**"   
  
... Eheh...   
**  
_ "Odd. Isn`t very like Bit to just head off on his own from what I know,"_ Vega thought, closing his eyes and getting something of a black-and-white picture in his sight as a result, though it soon faded to poorly defined color ala a 1960s-era television. The visual was of a Gustav arriving at the edge of a battlefield, followed by a Pterasniper and a Stormsworder being flung into the air by magnetics in their trailers, while in distance from that there was also the joint arrival of not one, but two HoverCargo-class Zoid Carriers...   
  
_ "What the heck?"   
  
_** Curiouser and curiouser... Do you feel it?   
  
**_ "Feel what?"_ Vega asked.   
  
** Listen, close...   
  
** Vega did as told, and several seconds later, he felt the rumblings of something or other, not noticably beyond a series of clicks in the background noise of the transmission itself. _"Nothing,"_ he reported back to the Fury, which seemed a bit annoyed and amused at the same time as a result.   
  
  
"Mobilizing the Raynos," Jamie stated, right as the Zoid blazed out of the cockpit with several twists, it`s main engine blasting to life and thrusting it forward before the pilot shifted slightly, bringing it to head upward towards the skies, but not too far up. _"You should let me handle this,"_ the Wild Eagle blandly stated. _"You may be improving but you aren`t anywhere up to what I can do."_   
  
_ "**Yet**,"_ Jamie corrected annoyedly, dragging the Raynos upward and into a wide, angling turn, keeping an eye to the scanner as he did so.   
  
"Mobilizing the Scout Fox," Brad stated, the small golden crafted Fox tearing out of the main launcher of the HoverCargo a few seconds later as a result, continuing on before landing on it`s feet in a sprint, it`s pilot already tensely awaiting the arrival of his enemies. It wouldn`t be an easy battle for him, but then again they never really were anymore, were they?   
  
One by one, the Thunder Team`s Zoids launched, starting first with the Assault Griffin, which practically rocketed up into the air under it`s own power out of the forward launch bay. After that came the Genosaurer, which rumbled through the air with a blast of flame and a smoothed-over roar, followed by a mysterious blue streak. The next to come was the Spike Sniper, screaming off of the launch deck with a menacing tone before touching down with a skid several steps in front of the larger Genosaurer, and the Command Wolf landed to their mutual right without so much as a word, glaring over at the small Scout Fox in what probably looked like - to the other Zoid, anyway - a combination of a dog in heat with a dangerously psychotic expression to boot.   
  
Brad on the other hand, was the picture of calm as the small Zoid stood it`s ground defiantly.   
  
"You should surrender while you`re ahead," Bram`s cool voice ordered menacingly as the Thunder Team`s ground membership started gathering together. He only let out a smirk. "Who`s first?" He asked dangerously, drawing a few surprised sounds from Laura and Bill, both of whom were taken aback by anyone being outright _crazy_ enough to try and fight a three-on-one battle with _anyone_, let alone in Class S, of all places.   
  
Bram on the other hand...   
  
"Take a guess," he stated, the Command Wolf starting to wander forward towards the Scout Fox, just as the Judge touched down with an ear shattering sonic boom.   
  
** "The area within a five mile radius is a designated Zoid Battlefield."   
  
**_ "Sounds like we`ve got company,"_ the Wild Eagle thought to his semi-comrade in arms. Jamie only grimaced and checked the scanner. Jeff and the Griffin were coming in at a faster speed than Jamie had anticipated, not fast enough but he was obviously trying to get into weapons range for a missile assault.   
  
** "This zone is now restricted. Only competitors and personnel have authorized entry."   
  
** To make matters worse, the Mercer Team was dead ahead, with Samantha`s Stormsworder making a snap U-turn to try and attack dead-on, while Tom`s Pterasniper was moving towards a cloud, obviously intent on finding a good vantage point to snipe at targets on the ground or in the sky.   
  
** "Danger!"   
  
** "You`re mine, Wild Eagle," Samantha`s voice exclaimed with challenge over the broadband.   
  
** "All others must leave the area at once."   
  
**_ "She wants me, let her have me!"_ The Wild Eagle demanded. Jamie met him with nothing but cold apathy though. _"It`s my time birdy, take a number,"_ he ordered, surprising himself with his own thought.   
  
** "Area scanned."   
  
** "Come and get me, you rat faced jackass," Brad ordered.   
  
"With pleasure, you furry assed bastard," Bram shot back.   
  
** "Battlefield set up."   
  
** The Command Wolf and the Scout Fox met half-way, staring each other down to the bemused looks of the other members on either team who were free to pay attention.   
  
** "The Blitz Team..."   
  
**_ "Brad looks pretty stoked out there,"_ Steven thought dryly, wondering if there was any actual history between Bram and Brad, or at least enough contact for them to actually try and insult one another`s appearances. Then again, it was probably just trash talk at random.   
  
** "Versus the Thunder Team..."   
  
** "He can`t be serious!" Laura growled. "I was looking forward to some easy points, damn it," she added in the same tone. "Let `im have his fun, we`ll just pick off the other guy if he manages to squeeze through," Bill ordered, maintaining a surprisingly level head as that blue streak touched down onto the Geno`s shoulder, revealing itself to be a thickly built, smoothly textured blue-black-and-red Organoid, one eye blue on the side of it`s face with a red eye socket, the other eye red on the side of it`s face with a blue eye socket.   
  
** "Versus the Mercer Team!"   
  
** "Keep him off balance, Sam, I`ll try and knock out that Griffin ahead of time," Tom ordered, calmly strategizing as the Pterasniper soared around in the cloud he had picked, turning around completely and hitting the air brakes while rising up out of the top, aligned perfectly with the sun to it`s back and the other three aerial Zoids practically lined up in front.   
  
"Balance? This poor bastard won`t know what balance is!" Samantha yelled back with reckless abandon, the Stormsworder and the Raynos continuing toward one another with the Griffin in tow.   
  
** "Battle Mode 0982."   
  
**_ "Here we go,"_ Brad thought in unison with his foe, the Command Wolf and the Scout Fox both beginning to circle one another with matching growls.   
  
** "Ready..."   
  
**_ "Damn it Jamie, **LET ME HAVE THIS ONE!**"_ The Wild Eagle screamed.   
  
"Time to kiss dirt, Wild Eagle," Samantha stated over the broadband with an audible grin. "My name isn`t the Wild Eagle," Jamie replied coldly as the two Zoids came closer and -   
  
** "_FIGHT!_"   
  
** "It`s Jamie Hameros."   
  
- The Raynos swung out of the way, wings folding in with a swift series of movements, at the exact moment of the Griffin`s attack. Samantha instantly found herself having to dive through a hail of rockets and missiles, narrowly avoiding a sniper round from her own husband, precisely firing straight past his wife`s cockpit only to plow through an incoming missile, zinging down through the air and gouging along the surface of the Griffin`s left wing. Even an inch lower and the other Zoid would`ve been knocked out of the sky.   
  
"_Remember it_!" Jamie yelled, a blistering salvo of pulse cannon-fire coming from the Stormsworder`s right side as the Raynos dove back into action, cutting into her flight path in such a way that any normal pilot and any normal Zoid would`ve been - for lack of a better term - screwed senseless.   
  
Samantha Mercer and her Stormsworder though, weren`t a normal pilot-Zoid pairing.   
  
She proved this seconds later, folding the wings in and hitting the air brakes combined with the retro-thrusters and the stomach mounted secondary thruster on it`s stomach, sending the Stormsworder to a near-reverse stop while ascending up and out of Jamie`s line of fire. The Raynos was swift though, dodging out of a stream of gattling gun-fire right as it`s own attack had ended.   
  
"Forgeting someone?" Jeffrey asked smugly, swooping up and diving down, only to let out a yell of surprise, luck literally being his only savior when Samantha whipped back into the fray, narrowly missing in her attempt to slice his Zoid in half down the middle. "Fluke," she muttered over the broadband, only to have to dodge out of the way herself a second later as the Raynos cut a shockwave into her path, trying to literally smash her and drag her to the ground with a sonic boom.   
  
"Not bad for an _amatuer_," she stated, simply diving right into the shockwave of the Raynos` flight, folding her wings in and dropping down behind the other Zoid, which promptly slowed down and changed directions. It seemed almost like he was getting instructions from someone else in mid-battle...   
  
On the ground though, things were just as chaotic as the Wolf and the Fox matched wits, claws, fangs and guns with one another, literally surprising Sloan, Steven and the Thunder Team entirely with the sheer ferocity with which the two fought.   
  
Bram dodged the Command Wolf out of the way of the Scout Fox`s main gun, Brad literally backflipped the Fox out of the way of the Wolf`s follow-up, and after several such attempts at a parry, the two Zoids finally clashed with one another using themselves as weapons. The Fox was smaller but it was tough, the Wolf was stronger and it`s size didn`t take away from it`s agility one bit. The first move went to Brad though, lunging forward and slashing out with one of the foreclaws, but the Wolf narrowly sidestepped and snapped it`s jaws shut around the Fox`s tail -   
  
"What the hell?!"   
  
- or not. The Scout Fox narrowly twisted out of the way, seeming to vanish in a split second and leaving the larger Command Wolf to stand in annoyed silence as Bram glared around, trying to find just where the other had vanished until finally -   
  
"Got you!"   
  
"In your dreams."   
  
- the Fox reappeared, it`s right forepaw ruthlessly slamming into the side of the Command Wolf`s face, raking it with it`s claws. Bram wasn`t ready, but he still responded in kind, sending his Zoid into a tumble and grappling around the Fox`s smaller body with ease, rolling over and smashing the little Zoid onto it`s side, leaving the two to continue rolling in a fierce biting match, before finally, Brad and Bram broke apart, darting away from one another and twisting around in the same exact moment, opening fire on each other - one shot from each.   
  
The result was probably one of the first times in recorded history that a bullet and a bolt of energy canceled one another out, with the bolt vaporizing the bullet only to short out after expending the greater deal of it`s energy in the process, fading out just a few feet short of hitting the Wolf in the back of the neck.   
  
"This may take longer than I thought," Bram admitted dryly. "Damn right it will," Brad replied sternly, squeezing the trigger again.   
  
The battle on the ground was intense but the battle in the skies was virtually redefining the meaning of ferocity, with the Griffin, Stormsworder and Raynos involved in one three-member furball and the Pterasniper taking potshots at anything that moved aside from it`s teammate, narrowly missing on each occasion. It was probably the first time in years that Tom Mercer had missed a shot more than once in a match, and to say the least, it was probably beginning to frustrate him.   
  
As for Samantha?   
  
"Hold still, damn you!"   
  
She was getting along just fine for the most part. Really.   
  
_ "Sit still? For god`s sake, it`s a supersonic air battle! You`re **supposed** to keep moving! And while you`re at it, keep an eye on your eight,"_ the Wild Eagle advised boredly. The fact that Jamie was relentless in keeping his alter ego out of the battle directly was really beginning to annoy the heck out of him, but for some reason or another, the Wild Eagle seemed too weak to really do anything about it other than whine.   
  
Jamie didn`t know whether to be relieved or worried.   
  
"Eat lead!"   
  
"I prefer it with ketchup, thank you very much," Jamie replied with cynical calm, narrowly dodging ahead of a stream of incoming gattling-fire before bringing the Raynos around. As the Wild Eagle had predicted, the Griffin appeared at what had been his 8 O` clock position, meaning that it had come in from Jamie`s left, a little behind him. "How did you dodge that?!" Jeff demanded over the comm, twisting into a barrel roll behind the Raynos before settling into a pursuit position.   
  
"I have a little voice in my head telling me how to?" Jamie asked with obvious sarcasm. The sad part was the he was actually telling the _truth_.   
  
"... That isn`t funny, schizo," Jeff grumbled, promptly opening fire on the Raynos again. Once more, Jamie dove out of the way but this time it still ended in damage being dealt out to a very severe degree, and not to the Raynos.   
  
"**_SHIT!!!_**" Jeff screamed as the Griffin went tumbling down, a single hole having been punched perfectly down it`s throat as the Pterasniper barrel rolled right over the hybrid Zoid, having taken the shot mere seconds earlier. After that, the Stormsworder went to work and the Griffin -   
  
_ "Ejector time..."   
  
_ - lost it`s head less than a second after the Thunder Team member had ejected, sending the already-system crashed Zoid tumbling to the ground miles below without even a head to speak of, the pilot, now in his parachute, screaming out insults and curses at the Mercer Team members.   
  
On the ground though, things had taken an increasingly violent turn as the Fox and the Wolf dodged around, slamming sideways into one another several times. Damage was obvious on both Zoids, but the pilots refused to stop for another, taking shots when they had the chance and trying to survive when they didn`t.   
  
Eventually though, it came down to the two breaking apart and coming to a dead stop several hundred yards apart. "Give up yet?" Bram asked.   
  
"Your mom," Brad replied, just as both of the two gave the triggers a pull and...   
  
"Well... That sucked."   
  
"Yep."   
  
They had both knocked each other`s command systems offline.   
  
The Fox had three rounds of varying size lodged in between it`s shoulders, the Wolf had it`s throat effectively blown open by three pulsed gattling shots. Brad and Bram were both out of the battle.   
  
That left it down to Jamie, the Mercers and what was left of the Thunder Team.   
  
Up in the skies, the battle was still as fierce as ever as Jamie dodged his way around, rabidly trying to keep from being picked off by Tom or cut to shreds by Samantha, who also started using her machine guns when all else failed.   
  
_ "They`d certainly eat Pierce for breakfast,"_ Jamie thought darkly, twisting the Raynos by another shot and then dropping down, narrowly avoiding Samantha`s wingblades for the umpteenth time. _"Who wouldn`t wanna eat Pierce for breakfast? Seriously, didn`t you **see** how she was stretching that flight suit?"   
  
"... You really sicken me sometimes..."_ Jamie muttered in thought at his alter ego, even while corkscrewing down to avoid another stream of machine gun fire from Samantha, a sniper round stabbing through the air just behind the Raynos after a few seconds. _"Are you going to just shit around with these people all day or are you going to take them out?"_ The Wild Eagle asked boredly.   
  
_"... Fine, you want `em?"_ Jamie demanded annoyedly, again dropping down to try and avoid yet another series of machine gun rounds from Samantha. _"**PLEASE!**"_ The Wild Eagle answered, literally screaming loud enough that Jamie felt physical pain in his ears. "Alright already," he muttered.   
  
"G-oh yeah..." The change was quick enough to take place in the span of a single spoken letter as the teen leaned forward with a fairly twisted little smirk as Samantha came in for another attack. "Think you can take me?" He asked, a great deal more confidence than Jamie had shining through in his voice. "Who the... What did you do with Hameros?!" Tom demanded angrily, literally hearing the change happen.   
  
"He just let me have some fun. Now then... _**OHHH SAMANTHA!!!**_"   
  
By the time the woman had even managed to grimace, the Raynos was gone, streaking up towards the clouds at mach three, twisting out of various sniper rounds from a newly desperate Tom Mercer. "I`ll be with ya in a minute, _babe_, I just have a little thorn I have to pluck from my side," he stated. At around the same time, a fairly sharp green blur shot by the Pterasniper, and a few seconds later, the sonic shockwave following said blur literally smacked the Zoid off course, sending it into a completely _in_voluntary ascent, just as the Wild Eagle pulled into a snap J-turn, heading straight back down and then -   
  
"Toodaloo!"   
  
- the Pterasniper had it`s left wing cut off, along with the 120mm sniper rifle it had been using to try and take down the Raynos from the start, causing Tom to scream while the green Zoid set itself upright several hundreds of feet below, just as Samantha came up, reluctant to use her machine guns for fear of hitting her husband, who had just narrowly ejected from the crashing Pterasniper.   
  
The Wild Eagle on the other hand, didn`t have to worry about hitting someone in a parachute, opening fire in a calculated manner. As predicted, Samantha snapped up and from there, it was all over.   
  
The Stormsworder had been sliced in half on the Raynos` wing, right at it`s midsection in a diagonal cut. Samantha let out a cursing scream and then hit the ejector switch, zinging out of the cockpit with a puff of smoke as the ejectorseat`s engine kicked in, throwing her away from the soon-to-explode Stormsworder.   
  
The Raynos on the other hand, swooped around a bit longer before the Wild Eagle set his sights on the two remaining targets on the ground. With a smirk though, he ceded control back to Jamie.   
  
_ "You can deal with `em, I got what I wanted,"_ he stated, just as Jamie let out a gasp and took back over, breathing hard as the Raynos slowed back down. It never felt easy when he switched in and out of personalities during a battle, even more so when the delayed realization that his surroundings had changed for some reason or another hit him. "I guess that leaves two more," he said to himself, raising the Raynos up and getting a good eye on the two targets on the ground. All it would take would be a good strafing run for the Spike Sniper, but the Genosaurer was going to be far harder to deal with.   
  
Would have been anyway, if not for a minor technicality.   
  
** "Warning! Warning! Unauthorized personnel have entered the battlefield, exit immediately!"   
  
** The Judge`s words seemed to fall on deaf ears though, just as a black streak shot into Jamie`s field of vision.   
  
"Jamie Hameros?" A voice asked over the comm, surprising both Jamie and the Wild Eagle at the same time, causing the teen to glance up from his would-be targets and set his eyes on the incoming blur of movement in the distance. "Yeah?" He finally asked.   
  
"I`m here to kill you. Nothing personal."   
  
In a matter of seconds, the green Zoid shocked from almost a dozen small impacts, sending it to wobble in it`s flight path as the black streak dashed overhead, now revealed to be none other than a slightly familiar Black Stormsworder. Gritting his teeth slightly, the young pilot barreled out of the way of a return attack, quickly trying to avoid getting filleted on the Black Stormsworder`s crest-blade.   
  
** "Unauthorized interference! Battle canceled! Battle canceled! This match is a _draw_!"   
  
** In a flurry of dodges and attacks, the Stormsworder and the Raynos dueled, with Jamie only barely pulling through each time before breaking into a mind numbing series of loops and corkscrews in a vane attempt to escape his would-be assassin, but the Black Zoid kept after him, following every move he made with the skill of a seasoned master behind the joystick. Sonic booms flared, and several lasers pulsed through the air at the Stormsworder, the result of a severely ticked off Bill Chapman, though it was only a prelude to a streak of blue, red and black, stabbing through the air at the Black Stormsworder with agility no normal Zoid could hope to match in a thousand years.   
  
For it`s effort, the Organoid known as Borealis managed to shake the pilot of the Stormsworder into breaking off of the attack on the Raynos.   
  
** "Rayth Takahori, leave the area at once or face strict penalties enforced by the Zoid Battle Comi-"   
  
** Two explosions at once, one in the skies, one on the ground.   
  
The one in the sky was followed by a smoking Borealis falling down from behing shield rammed by the equivelent of a normal Shield Liger, proving that the Black Stormsworder had more than a few tricks up it`s sleeves. The second came from a thinly crafted plasma beam, raining down from low orbit and cutting a swath of flame right up to the Judge Capsule, completely annihilating it before it could send off Rayth`s identity or the coordinates for a Judge Satellite to strike, let alone anything else.   
  
"Borealis! You son of a bitch!" Bill yelled over the comm, just as the Genosaurer locked it`s footlocks down and started charging up, letting out a medium powered charged particle beam at the intruder a few moments later. The Black Stormsworder swiftly dodged, but it`s pilot let out a curse as Jamie reappeared, raking across his attacker`s back with all three of the Raynos` pulse guns, causing the Stormsworder to wobble around slightly from damage.   
  
Another charged particle beam tore through the skies, Rayth narrowly twisted out of the way, Jamie followed suit.   
  
_ "Want me to deal with him?"_ The Wild Eagle asked finally. He had been silent since giving control back to Jamie but now things had drawn him out of his semi-stupor. _"No,"_ Jamie stated resolutely. "I can handle him..."   
  
_ "... No, you can`t."   
  
_ "Watch me."   
  
And with that, Jamie hit the afterburners, breaking past the sound barrier three times at once in the course of only a few seconds. The acceleration slammed him back into his seat but that wasn`t a real issue. The Raynos broke into a barrel roll and the Black Stormsworder began to try and doge but by then it was already too late. With a raking screech, the back of the Stormsworder burst into flames as the Raynos skimmed by it, using the very tip of one wing to put a precise line right into the other Zoid`s back.   
  
"_Damn it_," Rayth growled, rolling away and hitting his afterburners as well, promptly heading away from the battlefield, still being pursued by charged particle beams in the process.   
  
Jamie only wiped the sweat from his forehead, slowing back down to a far saner speed, swinging around in a wide angled turn with an equally widening grin. For the first time, he had proven that he truly didn`t need the Wild Eagle, even if only because Rayth had allowed his ego to get the best of him, letting his guard down as a result. As for what happened after that?   
  
_ "Told ya so!"   
  
"... Oh, shut up."   
  
_ Well, that`s another story best left for another day.   
  


_ End Chapter Nineteen  
  


* * *

  
  
_

**Author`s Note:** "And so... It begins..."  
  
God I love Babylon 5 :D And also: Yes, it was intentional for the Thunder Team to be so evenly matched with the Blitz Team. And yes, it was also intended that each member would share initials with his/her opposite number. And if you`re wondering: Tendro is a name pun. Tauros could be thought of as a mispronounced Taurus, a sign of the Zodiac. Tendro is Rodent if you spell it differently, and Rats are a sign in the Chinese or Japanese Zodiacs(forgot).  
  
And no, Bram and Brad don`t have a history. They were just randomly insulting one another right off the bat.  
  
**Endless Adventure:** Yeah, guess when ya look at it from that angle it isn`t TOO surprising. And yes, Bit is a closet Papaya addict *Snicker.*  
  
**Zinou:** Yeah. Zeke always seemed the type that`d become a bit sarcastic over time, and given that he`s had around 245 years to perfect the art... >_> Eheh. And yeah, it`s nice to see him portrayed as someone who`s actually both competent AND! intelligent at once! Not to mention almost normal about his lovelife >_>; As for the handleblade... He`ll be getting a whole lotta mileage outta that thing when the time comes @_@  
  
That`s all for now folks, Sh33p out! 


	21. Wild Child

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I do not own Zoids.  
  


* * *

  
  


** New Age**  
Wild Child   
  
  
  


Jamie let out a yawn while stumbling toward his bedroom. It was close to eleven now, he`d had a long day, basically come close to winning a battle, proven the currently silent Wild Eagle wrong and gotten a few cheap laughs at Brad`s expense on the way back to the base.   
  
Speaking of Brad, he was currently off somewhere with Naomi. Again. Jamie didn`t care either way though, that meant he could have some relative peace at the base - which was still a freezer at night. Having spent the past three hours doing nothing but running combat simulations, he was mentally exhausted, cold and currently had his eyes only half opened at best.   
  
Several steps into his bedroom, Jamie paused, turned around and slid the door shut, promptly locking it a few seconds later before continuing on to bed. "Time for sleep... Gneh..."   
  
And with that, the teen flopped face-first into bed with a dull, muffled thump against the mattress, kicking his shoes off and crawling up to where his head was obscured by the two pillows on the bed, then just laying there and falling asleep. It had indeed been a long day, and while Jamie Hameros was going to obviously be getting some sleep, the same just couldn`t be said for someone else.   
  
Or for the body they shared.   
  
The Wild Eagle opened his eyes the moment he felt Jamie`s mind enter into a dreamlike state, sitting up after a few seconds and stretching his arms and legs out before standing up. "Sleep good, dink," he said aloud, stretching his back until a familiar pop sounded through the otherwise quiet room. Jamie may have had a long day, but the Wild Eagle - Will E. as he called himself at the clubs - was intent on having an equally long night.   
"So, Stoller lets the kid do what he wants regardless then?" Doctor Tauros asked, leaning back a bit in the recliner that now bore an odd indentation in the general shape of his backside. Leena was still sleeping in the hospital bed, she`d be getting checked out the day after tomorrow but for now, it was only around 11:05 at night, and Steven was busy with a call to a certain someone.   
  
"Yes. My guess is that Stigma has a certain affinity for him, but for the most part it`s probably just business sense. The Backdraft handled things with him about the same," the woman at the end of the line replied. Said woman was Sarah Obscura, Vega Obscura`s mother and currently on the fast track to being one of the only four people that Steven actually spoke to on a recurring basis who were close to or at his own age group. The others were Oscar and Maria Hameros, and Harabec Davids, who Steven had struck a relative acquaintance up with following the events of Kale`s attack.   
  
"I see. So, for the most part, Vega is basically living by himself with a mechanic crew on call during his battles now," he surmised. "From what I saw yesterday, pretty much. Stigma still won`t talk to me and Vega probably doesn`t know my prison actually allows calls from certain people," she said with a sigh. "I think he`s still bitter over something or other."   
  
"You never really told me about that," Steve said with a frown, though the fact they were talking on the phone meant expressions were pretty much useless.   
  
"Stoller and I were pretty close friends once - nothing romantic, he isn`t my type and I`m not his. He introduced me to Vega and Kale`s father, a friend of his named Derrek. Stigma was there for our wedding, he was also there when both of our children were born, he even put off his last battle for close to nine years for an entire two days to be there when Derrek and I`s marriage started souring. He tried to keep us together but things didn`t go well and we split up."   
  
"I see."   
  
"To both of their objections, I put Kale and Vega into the Five Kings program. I thought it would give them both a claim on the future of the Backdraft by providing them with the skills to handle themselves in a battle at an early age. Derrek disagreed and broke the terms of our divorce, suing for legal custody so-"   
  
"So you had him killed," Steven deduced from what Stoller had told them all shortly after Kale`s assault.   
  
"Yes. I had him killed because there were only two other options: Lose my boys to their father or lose my career in the Backdraft and then lose them anyway to child welfare services since I didn`t really have many other job skills at the time," Sarah explained with a dry tone. "With reasons like those, I actually don`t blame you," Steven replied with an equally dry tone. "Right. Well, you might agree, but Stigma didn`t. He dropped out of complete retirement then and there to try and take over the Five Kings program."   
  
Sarah paused briefly.   
  
"He probably saved Vega`s sanity and kept Kale from going off the deep end for a good while longer than he would have otherwise. In the end though, membership of the program dropped... Two of the members died - Vega killed one of them himself in an accident during a battle," Sarah paused again before continuing. "When Stoller left the Group to try and fight Bit Cloud head on in an officially sanctioned battle, Kale lost his only major confident and friend aside from Rayth Takahori, who vanished not too long after that. With no one else left that he felt he could confide in about the stresses of the program, Kale went insane."   
  
"And Stoller blames himself for it," Steven finished for her. "Mostly, yes. Kale, Vega and Rayth were all like sons to him, so were the other two, I think that`s the real reason he`s trying to keep away from Kale and Vega`s conflict right now," Sarah mused. "Sounds like it did a number on him then," Steve commented. "It did a number on everyone, Vega still refuses to live around groups of people from what Stigma has been willing to tell me. He even demanded his quarters to be distant from everyone else`s during the last days of the Five Kings program, and when we found the Berserk Fury..."   
  
"He started sleeping in the hangar next to the Zoid," Steven said with a smirk.   
  
"How did you know?"   
  
"Bit did the exact same thing when he first got his hands on the Liger - still does sometimes, in fact," he answered. "Anyway, you were saying?"   
  
"Vega also started sleeping in the cockpit, he refused to be around group activities, even with kids his own age. As for Kale, he stole one of the Genosaurers we found with the Fury and fled. You know the rest from there, I assume?"   
  
"Yeah. I`m guessing that Stoller blames you for most of the damage," Steven mused. "Exactly."   
The desert, fifty-two miles South of Forintown. It was mostly empty, bar the occasional wild animal or two, and bar the even less frequent vehicle in the night. The most that could be seen was a certain black-and-blue Gustav, with another certain Zoid standing dimly on the one trailer that the Gustav would`ve been towing along were it moving. As it stood, both Zoids were sitting idle, a campfire set about ten feet away from the trailer, a sleeping bag a reasonable distance from that and a solitary figure eating what looked like the equivelent of a grilled cheeseburger on sandwhich bread.   
  
Said figure was one Marcus Harlock, currently a little paranoid and not afraid to show it since his handgun was sitting on the ground within plain reach. The safety was also _very_ obviously not in place.   
  
Two days ago, Mark had bested an assassin who had developed an extremely unhealthy infatuation with his girlfriend, and an equally unhealthy(for Mark, anyway) infatuation with seeing him dead. The Shadow Fox had basically healed the damage to it`s cockpit by now, and Arihmanes` Khukri had been stabbed into the ground next to the sleeping bag. Mark had developed something of an affinity for the awkward looking weapon, if only because it could probably take someone`s head off in an instant if he ran out of bullets.   
  
His thoughts were a bit distant, naturally, one tends to focus on more important things than the taste of their food whenever they realize they have a murderous assassin out for their heads, with said assassin also their significant other. In bed.   
  
Really, there were actually more important things than Zoid battles for some people. Of course the Shadow Fox was a bit miffed by that revelation, but it would get over it with time.   
  
However, the silence of the evening, and the relatively calm degree of reflection it awarded, was promptly snapped like a twig by the padding steps of something coming at a relaxed pace. Mark and the Fox both leered in the same direction at the same time, with the human of the two grabbing his gun and the Zoid swinging his AZ 30mm Laser Vulcan around to lock down the direction of the steps, which were coming from behind a fairly large looking rock.   
  
They continued. Marcus bit into his cheek, but they still continued until several seconds of silence came into play.   
  
And then...   
  
"That you, Newbie?"   
  
The Ivory Blade Liger lumbered around the rockside, coming to stand across from the Gustav, the Fox and the aforementioned 'newbie.' Mark grit his teeth a bit and lowered his gun back down before taking another chomp out of his dinner without so much as a word, greeting the other pilot with the universally accepted medium for communication known simply as: the middle finger.   
  
"Gee, swell to see you too," Kyle quipped as the Blade Liger`s cockpit swung open, allowing the former mechanic to stand straight up. "`M bufy ea`in`, guh wa`kuh," Mark replied with a mouth full of half-chewed food, gulping it down after a second while Kyle jumped down from the head of his Zoid, walking forward with his hands tucked into the pockets of his trowsers, absently noting the fact that Mark still had his gun in his lap.   
  
The Fox and the Liger on the other hand, picked up where they had left off at their last encounter, promptly growling out what equated to insults of varying degrees at one another.   
  
"Fox has a white Liger phobia now," Mark stated dryly, downing what was left of the burger without even chewing it before watching Kyle plop down across from where he was sitting on the opposite side of the fire. "So what can I shoot you for?" He asked lazily. "Nothing actually... Markie," Kyle replied with a snicker. "Only one person gets away with calling me that," Mark shot back, raising the gun again before lowering his aim.   
  
Lower.   
  
Lower still.   
  
And stopping at just the right level so that the barrel of the weapon was tilted in a direction that corresponded rather obviously with the general location of Kyle`s groin. "Just so we`re clear on that," Mark said. "Point taken. Anyway," Kyle shifted subjects, almost as if he wasn`t intimidated by the .45 caliber handgun presently aimed in such a manner that it threatened to permanently raise his voice up by about thirteen decibels. "I`m here to make an offer to ya..."   
  
"I don`t buy girlscout cookies. Especially not when the girlscout could stab me to death with his chin."   
  
"Actually, I`m offering that we could join forces to get to Class A."   
  
"I`m solo," Mark shot back, finally lowering the gun back down to the ground again. "So am I, this would only be temporary. An off-and-on sorta thing, get my drift?" Kyle asked blandly, leering over at the Ivory Blade Liger. "Will you stop teasing him?" He demanded. The Zoid growled out and then settled down onto it`s belly. The Fox on the other hand shrieked out the equivelent of an insult to something along the lines of the other Zoid`s paint job, which brought the Ivory right back up with a roar.   
  
"Do you honestly think those two are gonna work together?" Mark asked sarcastically, simply pointing at the two howling Zoids with his thumb. "Sure I do. Besides, it`d put you into Class A, one closer to Class S, and that means you`d get more intense battles."   
  
"I`m not really in this for battles, I`m mainly in this to help pay for Abbie`s college education," Mark retorted plainly. "Did I mention the pay would be higher?"   
  
"I`m listening."   
  
"We`d be on a timetable though. Four days to get to Class A," Kyle explained dryly. "... It takes 20 wins straight to get into Class A from Class B, 35 from C," Mark replied with the same tone. "Five matches daily. Can you handle that?" Kyle asked. "... Eh... I think you`re insane."   
  
"Yes, and?"   
  
"Stupid."   
  
"Point being?"   
  
"Suicidal."   
  
"I think that hit it on the head quite nicely."   
  
"What would the team name be?" Marcus asked after several seconds, listening to how the Fox and the Blade Liger were _still_ throwing insults at each other. "The Suicide Team, of course," Kyle replied with a slightly insane little glint in his eyes. "The Suicide Team?" Mark asked in an unbelievably cynical tone. "Yep."   
  
"Don`t blame me when people start laughing at how damn cheesy that sounds."   
The Rendosa Dance Club, 11:48 PM on the dot. Like every night, the place was packed to capacity, and probably beyond, and like every night, the place was blaring music, filled with an atmosphere of more designer-styled hallucinogens than you could shake a stick at, and like every night it was home to close to four hundred and fifty people with ages ranging from 19 to 28, along with the occasional exception of someone who looked old enough and had the proper amount of skill with forging identities and the like.   
  
The Wild Eagle, also known as both Jamie Hameros and Will E.(Edgars) depending on the time, setting and personality, was one of these exceptions. How he had gotten his identification was a simple matter of properly made laminated cardboard and plastic with a picture of himself, fake address, age and the like, and his false name, William Edgars. The end result was that he was now able to get into a club which generally only allowed 18 and up admissions.   
  
Several seconds passed, and the Wild Eagle nonchalantly stepped inside, ducking past a man on his way out who had obviously had just a _bit_ much to drink. As evidenced by the fact that he promptly threw up on himself after exiting the club.   
  
"The sweet smell of fun to be had," he said to himself, casually hopping out of the way of a random clubber, who was obviously about as wasted as the first person he had dodged away from. The action allowed him to do something he tended to do every night that he came to this place: The chance to dive over the safety railing and drop ten feet down to the dance floor.   
  
With two flips and a corkscrew followed by a floor clearing twist on his head, fluidly breakdancing to his feet at the end, that was exactly what the Wild Eagle did, springing back up to his feet and joining everyone else after several seconds. Given that it was routine, nobody was really bothered in the least by it, but one person still caught his eye.   
  
She was about a half-a-head shorter than he was, slightly on the thinnish side, tanned and had extremely light, bluish-silver hair. To boot, she was looking right at him with a pair of strangely familiar-yet-different green eyes.   
  
The Wild Eagle smirked to himself.   
  
It was going to be a good night.   
  
A _very_ good night indeed.   
  
  
"You failed," a fairly threatening voice rang through the ears of one Rayth Takahori. He was presently flying several hundred feet in front of a fast moving Whale King, knowledgeable of the key fact that every forward firing gun on the massive airship - including a BFG-sized Charged Particle Cannon - was presently aimed at his smoking Stormsworder.   
  
"He caught me off guard," he responded after several seconds, remaining unphased at his employer`s icy glare. "I`m beginning to question whether or not you truly have what it takes to be in this organization for much longer," the other stated grimly. "I have what it takes, I was caught unprepared. Hameros had just switched out of the Wild Eagle, I thought he would be weaker."   
  
"But instead, you thought wrong. Extraordinarily careless for someone with a record like your`s. I almost have to wonder if Kale is as incompetent..."   
  
"Kale would kill you before he works with anyone."   
  
"Just like you refuse to work with other Rommel warriors... What is this with you 'Kings of the Battlefield,' anyway? Are you too good to work with anyone else?" The green eyed man asked, gingerly running a hand over the head of the green Organoid, which rested it`s chin on his right knee like a gigantic dog, leering ominously at Rayth with murderously golden eyes. "Yes. We are. Send anyone to work with me and I`ll shoot them down myself," Rayth growled back.   
  
"Well then, I`ll give you two more chances. If you fail to bring down Hameros and kill him, I`ll assign you to something else... Something you can`t screw up."   
  
"... Don`t take me lightly Rommel. I may be at less than full capacity right now but I can still cripple your Whale King and every Zabat, Stormsworder, Griffin, Raynos, Pteras or Redler you send at me. At once," Rayth threatened in the same tone. "And I`m also smart enough not to make stupid mistakes like you... Handing off a Scout Fox to a member of the Blitz Team."   
  
"Not that it matters much. I just wanted to test out the design after all," Rommel shrugged. "Then you could have done better than you did... By far," Rayth spat. "I do what I want, when I want. Now go and make yourself useful somehow, Rommel out."   
  
The screen blipped off and the Whale King`s gunports slid shut once again, just as the enormous carrier Zoid banked gently off to the side, heading into the distance of the evening. Rayth only popped his jaw several times and continued hobbling along. This wasn`t what he had been offered, not at all. At least in the Backdraft, they treated him with respect.   
And speaking of a certain elder heir to the Obscura family name, Kale was presently seated in the cockpit of his Genosaurer. He was also presently staring dangerously ahead, occasionally glancing off to either side but generally just staring ahead, because ahead was where most of the firepower would probably come from.   
  
"Surrender, Kale Obscura. We have you surrounded!" The leader of the group of Command Wolves stated. It was obvious that they were Guardian Force operated Zoids, they had the symbol of the Helic Republic crossed with the Guylos Empire with a globe of Zi in the background marked on either shoulder of each Zoid. "You people must have a death wish," Kale stated blandly. "Surrender now! You`re wanted for the Massacre at Raven Heights, as well as over 88 other individual and group murders, not to mention all the property damage you`ve caused in your little spree."   
  
"... Yes. You all have one hell of a death wish," Kale repeated. The Genosaurer cracked it`s neck to either side with a low, menacing growl.   
  
"To be a sport, I`ll give you all as long as it takes to make peace with your gods. After that, I`m going to kill you. One. By. One."   
  
"We`re not afraid of you," one of the pilots stated, the Command Wolf he was in promptly bristling somewhat. "Then something is obviously wrong with your heads," Kale replied. "I`ve had just about enough of you," the commander stated. "Really? And I care why? You`re going to be dead in a matter of minutes anyway..."   
  
"For someone as outnumbered as you are, you`ve got a lot of nerve."   
  
"Five..." Kale stated, beginning to dryly count down. "Surrender at once!"   
  
"Four..." He continued. "This is your last warning!"   
  
"Three..." He said again, practically not hearing anything at all. "Have it your way... _Fire at will_!"   
  
"Two..."   
  
The Genosaurer vanished in a burst of flame from the backs of it`s lower legs, just as the ground it had been standing on exploded in a blaze of firepower from the entire task force of close to fifteen Command Wolves. "And here I was giving you a grace period," Kale chided, even as the claws of the Genosaurer found their mark in the cockpit of the lead Zoid...   
"You`re payin` for your own trailer," Mark stated, climbing into his sleeping back and pausing long enough to glance up at the howling Shadow Fox with an annoyed glint. "_**SHUT THE HELL UP ALREADY, WILL YA?!**_" He screamed, causing the Zoid to turn it`s howling on him for several seconds.   
  
Until it saw the bloodshot look in his eyes. The Fox finally silenced from there, as did the Liger, both Zoids settling down wherever they were as Kyle unrolled his own sleeping bag across from Marcus on the opposite end of the campfire. "You`re still towing it though, right?" Kyle asked. "Gee, brainiac, I`m the one who owns a Gustav, you do the math..."   
  
"Yeesh, I know _someone_ who needs some pie... Markie."   
  
"... Shut up."   
  
"Markie."   
"Shut. Up."   
  
"_Markie_."   
  
A gunshot sounded through the desert.   
  
"Much better."   
  
"... Eeee..."   
  
"G`night Chinny."   
  
And these two were somehow honestly expected to work together? For four whole days? Let alone anything after that?   
Morning. Jamie figured it to be about 10:30, he usually woke up around then if his alarm clock wasn`t working right. Apparently, this morning that was just the case. _"Need to buy a space heater,"_ he noted tiredly to himself, if only because the Blitz Team base really _was_ a virtual freezer at night. It had been more so given the fact that Jamie didn`t actually know _where_ the temperature controls for the base were, it seemed only Steven did.   
  
With a languid yawn, the teen leaned up in bed, only then realizing that he wasn`t wearing a shirt. "Must`ve yanked it off somehow last night," he guessed at himself with another yawn, finally wiping the sleep out of his eyes enough to realize that this wasn`t his bedroom. This was a motel room.   
  
With a twitch, Jamie lifted the covers just enough and then dropped them back down, promptly glaring around for his clothes at the realization that he was naked, until slightly delayed logic hit him:   
  
For starters, he was naked. He was also in a hotel room. Why though?   
  
With a slight twitch, the teen glanced to the other side of the bed and then promptly yelped in shock, stirring the other occupant with a similar reaction as the two toppled off of the bed with a pair of matching thuds on the roughly carpeted floor, yanking the blankets into a tug of war until Jamie got his hands on the undersheet and gave a solid yank, leaving whoever the other person was to claim the comforter.   
  
"How the hell did I get here?!" Both of them asked, both promptly going silent in an instant.   
  
_ "... Ah crap..."_ Jamie thought, wrapping the sheet around himself like a toga and then slowly standing up as the other person followed suit, both exchanging mortified glances at each other.   
  
"Gee... Fancy meeting you here..." Jamie said with a slight wince.   
  
"You too..." Leyla replied with the same morbid expression.   
  


_ End Chapter Twenty  
  


* * *

  
  
_

**Author`s Note:** Eheh... Heh heh... Poor Jamie >_>; Now you know why Brad saw "Jamie" leaving at night on the security cameras. And yes, Kyle and Mark **ARE** going to effectively take over the starring role, along with the other OCs and probably Jamie(and Brad if I can cram him in somehow) for the next few chapters. And yes, they **will** fight through twenty battles in four days. The real question is whether or not they`ll kill one another in the process.  
  
**Vile21x:** With any luck I`ll be able to avoid turning this into a romance story all together. I prefer keeping the love stories on the side, otherwise they get in the way of everything else, yanno? And yeah, this **won`t** be a B/L. If anything, you can probably expect **Harry** to be the one to try and lay the moves on her. When he shows up again, anyway.  
  
**Zinou:** *Gets out the life support.* You`ll be needing this if you were freaked by the action from before... The next four chapters will focus **very** heavily on action :P As for Brad and Bram... I dunno, to me Brad seems the type who would be innately hostile to any man with the same sort of personality as him, _especially_ someone who`s going to prove as similar to him as Bram is.  
  
**EndlessAdventure:** Closer to Riese`s actually, I`ve never seen the crystal saurer or whatever it is. As for the Organoids... Borealis is actually going to have a bit of a story of his own if I get the chance to put Bill into the story a bit more. He isn`t any sort of weirdo offspring of Ambient and Specular, and he isn`t related to Shadow and Zeke, and he has a slight... Connection to a few others in the story. I think I`ll leave it at that, eh?  
  
Glad you enjoyed the banter between Jamie and Jeff :p  
  
And that`s all for now. Sorry to leave ya hangin` folks but I won`t be able to update for a little while, since I need to write down the next few parts of New Age. See you in a week or two!  
  
Sh33p out. 


	22. Boom

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I do not own Zoids.  
  


* * *

  
  


**New Age**  
_ Boom   
  
_

"Boom! Here comes the Boom!   
Ready or not, here comes  
The boys from the South   
Boom! Here comes the Boom!   
How you like me now?"  
  
  
Sleep was a wonderful thing for the tired, both mentally and physically. It allowed the body to rest and the mind to wander, it also allowed one to ignore the events of the day for however short a time it would be that they slept. When Marcus Harlock had climbed into his sleeping back at close to 12:00 last night, he hadn`t expect just how short that amount of time would be.   
  
"**_WAKE!_**"   
  
The sound of a hard *CLANG* of a pan and something hitting it.   
  
"**_UP!_**"   
  
Another *CLANG* of a pan and whatever was being used to hit it.   
  
"**_MARKIE!!!_**"   
  
Followed by the sound of an irate *THWACK* and a dull thud as one hapless looking Kyle Mazemia toppled over backwards, now bearing a fist-sized bruise on his normally perfect chin, landing with a thud on the ground and a swirly eyed expression as Marcus sat up in his sleeping bag, arm still reflexively outstretched for several seconds before what could best be described as delayed pain kicked in.   
  
"_Ow_," Mark yelped, drawing his hand back and shaking it around rather violently in a futile effort to shake away the pain. "What the hell is your chin made of man?! It feels like I just got stabbed in the hand!" He complained annoyedly. Kyle spent several seconds more laying on the ground before slowly propping up on his elbows and throwing his head forward with a wounded looking smirk.   
  
"_Never_ hit a bishounen in the chin!" He exclaimed proudly before falling back in a fit of demented laughter.   
  
"... I must`ve hit you too hard," Mark stated dryly.   
  
  
_ "**HEY BIRD-ASS, WAKE UP!!!**"_ Jamie demanded, a bit irately too no less. The Wild Eagle only let out a sound akin to someone having an _especially_ good dream. If not for the situation at hand, Jamie would have probably broken into a fit of twitches and screaming at his alter ego, but some things just... Mattered a bit more right now. Like not blowing one`s own top off trying to get someone only you could speak to to wake up. "Yanno... How did we wind up here?" Jamie asked dryly.   
  
"I don`t know. None of my others are up..."   
  
"Others?" Jamie asked. "Nothing," Leyla shrugged, glancing off to the side. "Any idea where our clothes are?" She asked. "Probably the bathroom," Jamie replied dimly, still blushing from ear to ear. It was just one of those quirky situations that caused one to be both insanely embarrassed and perfectly calm at the same time.   
  
It also called for an extremely _frigid_ shower by the end of it, but that`s not the point.   
  
"After you, I guess..." Jamie said, calmly waiting for Leyla to check the bathroom. This was going to be one of those days...   
  
  
"Who`re the first victims?" Mark asked lazily, sipping away on some hastily brewed coffee while Kyle and the Blade Liger jogged alongside the Gustav, the other pilot grumbling out his answer a few seconds later. "The Serpentine Team," Kyle stated dryly, leaning his head back with an amused expression. "The lowest ranked team in Class B? Eesh..."   
  
"Tell me about it."   
  
"And after we beat them?"   
  
"The Packard Team, the Faren Team, the Orwell Team and the Bastard Team."   
  
"The Bastard Team?"   
  
"They apparently walk around wielding hand-and-a-half swords, AKA Bastard Swords. Must`ve sounded cool at the time," Kyle said with an audible shrug. "Sounds like we`ve got our work pretty much cut out for us, huh?" Mark asked, tongue in cheek. "Yep. And did I mention we won`t be able to get full repairs at all today, tomorrow or the day after that? Or after that even?"   
  
"In other words: Don`t live up to the team name," Marcus replied. "Sadly," Kyle grumbled back. "How`s the chin?"   
  
"Flawless."   
  
"... God damn bishounen."   
  
"Hand still bruised, eh?"   
  
"Oh shut up, Chinny."   
  
"Markie."   
  
"_Chinny_."   
  
"_Markie_."   
  
"Don`t make me shoot you."   
  
"Bah."   
  
"Meh."   
  
"Shut up dickpipe."   
  
"Make me, assclown."   
  
One of the Blade Liger`s blades lowered down, extending outward sideways and tipping itself in just the right way to level it`s blaster on the cockpit of the Gustav.   
  
"... Feh," Marcus growled, shutting up a few seconds later as Kyle snickered like a lunatic.   
  
  
"All fifteen Command Wolves, along with the badly burned remains of their pilots, were recovered as little more than torched scrap metal. The Guardian Force remains reluctant to comment on this but initial reports seem to indicate that a black Genosaurer was spotted leaving the site of the massacre. This might indicate that the renegade fugitive, Kale Obscura, the mass murderer responsible for the slaughter at Raven Heights is also responsible for this atrocity. In other news though, upstart sensation Marcus Harlock and the rising style that is Kyle Mazemia have recently formed a team and declared that they`ll fight no less than _twenty_ battles in _four days_ to get to a match against the Fluegel Te-"   
  
"Should be interesting to watch," Brad commented. "Assuming they actually make it," Leon shot back as Naomi entered the room, soundlessly plopping down next to Brad on the couch. Given that the couch had no real room left with the way that Leon and Naomi were seated, Leon was sitting on the chair next to them, and all three were blandly watching the television.   
  
It was just another mundane day with no battles. They always did this when they got the chance of course, but still.   
  
"I think they will," Naomi finally stated with a small shrug, settling in leaned against Brad. "So do I, but those are two people who don`t exactly see eye to eye, and they`re not really that experienced with their Zoids."   
  
"Mark managed to draw against Bit," Brad pointed out dryly. "That was obviously a lucky fluke, more due to the Zoid than the pilot," Leon replied. "Eh..."   
  
"Don`t argue with Leon on this Brad, he spent five hours re-watching the battle just to pick apart Bit`s moves."   
  
"Exactly why I think he`s wrong," Brad shot back with a smirk. The oldest of the Tauros siblings only quirked up an eyebrow in response. "Though if they do make it, pop off one of the Fox`s legs for me, will ya?" He asked. Naomi only rolled her eyes. "Would have anyway," she stated, allowing a fairly rare bit of some emotion or other - spite perhaps? - to shine through her generally cool outer shell.   
  
  
An explosion sounded in the distance as the Shadow Fox and the Ivory Blade Liger lumbered onto the outer boundary of the battlefield, immediately finding themselves confronted by four Stealth Vipers, all of them lined up in a blatant show of their numbers and armament, obviously trying for intimidation against enemies that could probably tear them limb from limb in a matter of seconds.   
  
Which is exactly what Kyle and Mark intended to do.   
  
"Two on four," Mark commented dryly, pulling his gloves taut for several seconds until they fit perfectly, then grabbing the controls and cracking his neck from side to side. "Poor bastards won`t ever know what hit them," Kyle replied with a smug tone. "And you say _I`m_ unprofessional," Marcus quipped sarcastically. "You are. There`s a slight difference between being moderately confident and being a total newbie."   
  
"... Oh shut up, pretty boy."   
  
"Wanker."   
  
"**_HEY! THAT`S MY INSULT, DAMNIT!_**"   
  
"What kind of uncoordinated idiots are we up against here?" The voice of one of the Serpentine Team members asked dimly, just as the Judge began laying down the law, a robotic voice filling the entire battlefield a few seconds later. Judges didn`t rely on radio communications most of the time, that was why the capsules were half as large as they were: To contain loudspeakers. It sounded more imposing, after all, and people with attention spans as short as most current-generation warriors tended to listen more if the Judges could vocally intimidate the hell out of them.   
  
** "The area within a two mile radius is a designated Zoid Battlefield. This zone is now restricted to competitors and authorized personnel. All others must leave the area at once. Area scanned. Battlefield set up. The Serpentine Team versus the Suicide Team. Battle Mode 0138. Ready..." **  
  
"Dibs on the two on the left."   
  
"I got one better," Mark replied. "Eh?" Kyle asked. "Make a bet with you, loser pays for dinner at the place of the winner`s choosing," Marcus stated challengingly. "Meaning?" Kyle asked again. "Whoever nails the most leaders of the opposing teams wins," Mark answered. "You`re on, Newbie," Kyle quipped. "I`ll make you eat those words, Chinny."   
  
** "_FIGHT!_" **  
  
The bell rang and Kyle and Marcus immediately learned just _why_ the Serpentine Team was apparently being so straight forward with no real formation, no actual tactics or anything else: It let them throw out a literal wall of firepower with minimal effort. The Stealth Vipers lowered their heads and both the Fox and the Liger found themselves shocked into dodging out of the way as artillery-sized pulse cannons let out an _actual_ wall of lethal plasma, only missing by inches as the two other Zoids dodged away.   
  
"No god damn wonder why they made it into Class B," Marcus groaned as the Shadow Fox went onto the attack, springing towards the Vipers with an errant, random pattern to it`s movements, explosions going off two at a time to either side.   
  
At least the were.   
  
Then a certain ivory streak sliced through two of the Vipers and slammed hard into the third with it`s shield, leaving the fourth unscathed more by accident than design. It didn`t last long though, succumbing to a withering hail of fire from the Shadow Fox when it`s pilot became distracted by the fact that three of his team mates just went down in a blaze of non-glory. Pulse lasers carved out nicely sized gaps into the Zoid`s body, stabbing into the Stealth Viper until a visible hole ran through it`s neck, just beneath the head.   
  
The remaining Viper crashed to the ground with a thud and Mark snickered. "Not to mention the lowest rated team there."   
  
** "The winner is... The Suicide Team!" **  
  
"Which of you poor saps is the leader?" Kyle asked dryly, the Ivory Blade Liger`s blades folding back out of use and it`s shield fading away like it had never been there at all. "Me," the third Stealth Viper pilot stated with a dazed voice. "Damn," Mark grumbled with a snort. "One for me," Kyle stated cheerfully. "Along with all the bonus points for smashing over half their team. _**HA-HA!**_" He screamed over the broadband at Marcus, who only twitched slightly.   
  
The Shadow Fox gave a somber nod, growling something that sounded to Mark like an insult to white Ligers and their pilots. "Yep," Mark agreed, leaning back a few seconds later.   
  
** "The next battle will begin as soon as the Serpentine Team is removed from the battlefield." **  
  
  
"Well, that was disappointing," Harabec commented dryly, sliding a platter down the counter towards a customer and then nodding absently to himself. He`d half expected a quick battle, but that was just a _bit_ anti-climactic.   
  
Abbie on the other hand - who was standing not too far away, exiting the kitchen with someone`s order - gave off a literal twitch at the sight of her boyfriend on the battlefield. Given her own family`s history with Zoid battling, she didn`t much like to see him out there, especially if he was using the need to help pay for her college bills as an excuse for it.   
  
  
Thing were suitably less awkward now. For one, both teens were now dressed, and both were sitting a good distance across from one another, with Jamie fretting about whether or not the Wild Eagle used a condom and Leyla pretty much staring off into space, zoned out for some reason or another. to put things into perspective: It was about as comfortable a setting as having a knife at one`s throat, a gun to your crotch and a hammer wound up to smash in your kneecaps all at the same time. Just less painful.   
  
"So..."   
  
Leyla coughed slightly.   
  
"How the hell did this... Did we... You and... Just... How did this all happen?" Jamie asked, stumbling over his words at several points in the process. Obviously, it wasn`t one of the young Hameros` shining moments as far as his social skills went. Leyla didn`t seem all that phased though. In fact, she seemed to instantly look a few years older, her eyes even almost looked darker, as did her hair. Not noticably, but it was there enough that the change in her voice could cause one to see it.   
  
"My guess is that Connie and Will unwittingly used our bodies for..." She cleared her throat. "Connie and Will?" Jamie asked dryly. "I know I have the Wild Eagle... I guess you know too by now, but who`s Will?" He questioned. Leyla shrugged. "Will E."   
  
"Wild Eagle," Jamie recognized instantly. It was simple a matter of replacing the D with another L and then using E as an initial. Simple, and very, _very_ against anything Jamie himself would ever pick as an alias, simply because it sounded too much like the kind of name you could expect for a pimp. Or a plain womanizer, which brought another question to Jamie`s mind: Just how many times had this happened and he didn`t know about it? And with how many women?   
  
_ "Christ... Now I`m gonna have to go get tested just in case he didn`t use condoms,"_ he thought mournfully, shutting out the world for a short while and hoping he didn`t have any diseases. "I`d love to stay and chit-chat, but Leyla`s father is probably worried sick by now," Leyla stated, rising up off of the couch and adjusting the plaid skirt that 'Connie' had picked out. Apparently, she had one twisted sense of fashion, picking a warped schoolgirl outfit to go dancing in...   
  
Then again, given the way that the rest of the people in that club had been dressed, it really wasn`t _that_ outrageous. Either way though, the way she sauntered around caused Jamie to glance away by default. "Do you want her phone number?" She asked, seeming to not actually be Leyla at all anymore. She even had a slightly more mature walk that both Leyla and 'Connie' lacked. "Why would I need that? Don`t I have it already?"   
  
"She has two of them. A number she shares with her father, which allows him to listen in on her calls, and one that she pays for through battles, which he doesn`t listen to."   
  
"Oh. Sure," Jamie replied dryly, holding his head in one hand. "1-155-1450," she stated rather autonomously, already heading for the door. "Though for your sake, pray that her father never finds out about this."   
  
"I just hope nothing... Yanno... Happens," Jamie replied, still obviously more than a bit out of it in his own right. "Agreed."   
  
And with that, the door swung open and slammed shut, and Jamie Hameros was left alone. Completely and utterly alone.   
  
  
"How nice of the Packard Team to dick out, eh?"  
  
"I`m not complaining. Just means we don`t get beaten in as badly..."  
  
"Such optimism."  
  
"Can it, Newb."   
  
**"The Faren Team versus the Suicide Team! Battle mode 0138. Ready?" **  
  
Three Dark Horns and an Iron Kong against a white Blade Liger and a large Fox-type. The Dark Horns alone were packing dual Hiblit Guns on their backs, one was also toting around a rocket launcher and the Iron Kong was coming to the fight with a surplus of beam cannons and a temporary flight pack. The Blade Liger had an interchangeable blaster system, two rotating blades, a shield generator and a Double Impact Cannon, the Shadow Fox had two Strike Laser Claws, a back mounted AZ 30mm Laser Vulcan Gun and a hidden EMP missile launcher.   
  
Logically speaking, the Dark Horns and the Iron Kong were packing the kind of power that could level a small army and hard enough armor to soak up a kiloton or two of damage with ease. It really shouldn`t have been much of a question as to who was going to win but...   
  
** "_FIGHT!_"   
  
** In a world where the impossible happened daily, logic didn`t really have much of a foothold on reality.   
  
"Blade Liger first," the pilot of the Iron Kong ordered, even as the Suicide Team charged in at full speed, with the Shadow Fox almost instantly overcoming the Blade Liger as far as speed went, and that meant that Mark got the chance to attack first, darting past all three of the Dark Horns and bringing the Fox into a blatant lunge on the Iron Kong, which spitefully backhanded it right into the air with ease, sending off a hail of sparks and bits of metal on both sides of the collision.   
  
The Blade Liger on the other hand, with Kyle at the controls, swiftly dodging through the fire of the Dark Horns, narrowing in on the one that had a missile launcher and swinging it`s blades into the forward firing setting. "How`d`ye do?" Kyle quipped, bringing his Zoid to a complete stop at point blank with the Dark Horn, then blowing it`s upper back right off, along with the top portion of the head behind the cockpit, in one double salvo from the blasters, swinging the blades back into neutral a second later.   
  
It was about that time that Marcus and the Shadow Fox touched down with a loud set of thuds and the sounds of gears spinning like mad as the stabilizers went to work, though the Zoid had somehow managed to land on it`s feet. _"So the direct approach won`t work,"_ Mark thought dizzily, bringing the Fox into another sprint for the Kong with a none-too-cautious sort of approach to it`s movements, just as the smoke dischargers flipped open with a series of hard clacks, instantly beginning to spray off a black trail.   
  
"Let`s see how well you fight blinded," Marcus challenged, just as the Fox reflexively jumped over the Kong`s right fist, which promptly cratered into the ground while the Zoid itself vanished from sight, enveloped by a black cloud.   
  
It was also about this time that the second Dark Horn crashed to the ground, neatly sliced in half at the jawline with such precision that the floor of the cockpit became paper thin in a matter of seconds, leaving the Ivory Blade to continued on with just one opponent.   
  
"You work way, way too slow."   
  
"_Strike Laser Claw!_"   
  
An explosion shattered the black smoke cloud and turned it into a rising fireball as the Shadow Fox flew back out, catching the remaining Dark Horn unprepared and neatly slicing open the back of the Zoid, right down where any sort of spine would be. The golden energy of the Strike Laser Claw was lethally efficient, plowing through close to eight inches of thick, black armor in under a second, even as the Fox itself corkscrewed overhead and finished it`s twist in perfect timing to avoid smacking into either of the Dark Horn`s guns, completing a second twist before touching down on it`s forelegs and skidding to a complete halt, turning around at the Blade Liger with a smug growl.   
  
"Nah, I just have something you completely lack."   
  
"A chin incapable of splitting a man`s skull open?"   
  
"Better. I got _style_," Marcus stated proudly, just so that one could almost hear him cracking a smile. "Eh... That just means the money for dinner is comin` outta your share of the wins," Kyle shot back. "Which reminds me..."   
  
"Hey Judge!" Marcus called out, reasonably guessing that the remains of the Faren Team weren`t going to be able to answer the question either way. "Who was the leader of the Faren Team and what Zoid was he in?"   
  
** "Lucas Faren, Iron Kong Domina." **  
  
"... Oh look, guess I won`t be paying for you to stuff your face after all, huh?" Mark asked with a smirk. "... Oh shut up, Newbie. We`re only tied now."   
  
  
"He`s improving a bit," Harabec observed calmly, polishing off a glass as he did so. Abbie merely grit her teeth and faked a smile before walking back into the kitchen. The old veteran just shrugged to himself afterward and went back to polishing the glass off until -   
  
"Whoops!"   
  
- there was a crash in the kitchen, followed by a slightly irate growl as one of the waiters darted out and all but hid behind Harabec with the look of someone who had just seen death in the eyes and somehow lived to tell the tale. "I`m guessing she gave you, '_The Look_?'" The former champion asked, nonchalantly ignoring the sound of Abbie grumbling out various curses to herself with just enough of a hostile tone that it basically screamed 'run away!' on sight, just loud enough that only he and the waiter could hear it, given their positioning relative to the kitchen. The waiter numbly shook his head yes in answer.   
  
"Just keep out of `er way `til after the end of the workday, trust me," Harabec stated dimly, returning to his glass without another word.   
  
  
** "Battle mode 0138. The Orwell Team versus the Suicide Team! Ready..." **  
  
"Two on three..."   
  
"Eh... I`ll knock `em all off with one shot like I did earlier."   
  
"Not if I beat you to it."   
  
"You? Beat _me_? Yeesh Mark, li`l man syndrome from the fact the Liger`s bigger than the Fox?"   
  
"... Kyle... Quite frankly, at least I can actually use it because _someone_ didn`t botch my circumcision. Let`s leave it at that," Mark shot back with a slack tone of voice. "... No comment."   
  
"Concession accepted... Chinmo."   
  
"... Oh shut the hell up or I`ll stab you to death with my nose."   
  
**"_FIGHT!_"**   
  
"Your _nose_?! Jesus man..."   
  
"Incoming!" Kyle shouted, breaking the festively sardonic nature of the conversation and causing the Zoids to jump out of the way of a hail of incoming missiles. The Orwell Team weren`t pushovers compared to most Class B teams, but they definately weren`t the best. Two Rev Raptors, a modified Dibison, tailor made for firing off salvos of missiles and rockets, and a Heldigunner, standard equipment. Powerful enough to smash most opponents, agile and speedy enough to outmanuever most others and well rounded enough that they could deal with virtually any combination of ordinary Zoids.   
  
Keywords to that statement: ordinary Zoids.   
  
As Doctors Leyon Martin and Steven Tauros could easily verify, neither the Shadow Fox, nor the Ivory Blade Liger were ordinary Zoids.   
  
In a matter of seconds, what had started as a battle to see who could overwhelm the other first had turned into an outright slugging match as the Shadow Fox jumped over the Heldigunner, while the Blade Liger dealt with both of the Rev Raptors, narrowly avoiding their blades with each pass while at the same time trying to slice the two Zoids into mincemeat with it`s own, only barely missing each time.   
  
As for the Dibison? Well, the pilot of that was having more than his fair share of sadistic amusement watching the Shadow Fox try and literally dance away from incoming rockets and missiles, edging back and then having to dodge passes from the Heldigunner with every few seconds.   
  
"Looks like the opponents just got tougher," Kyle commented. "Either that or you just suck," Mark shot back. "... I was asking for that, wasn`t I?" Kyle asked, dryly watching the ease with which the Shadow Fox was dodging around before it finally made an attack, twisting in mid-jump to swipe the Heldigunner in the chin during a pass. "Pretty much," Mark replied, the Fox touching down and springing back as the Heldigunner started dropping from the air.   
  
"I mean really..."   
  
Several quick shots fired from the underside of the Fox.   
  
"It can`t be _that_ hard, can it?"   
  
The Heldigunner pilot screamed over the broadband and his Zoid ceased movement as it`s right side literally blew open in a fireball, leaving only the Dibison for Mark to deal with.   
  
"Say`s the one who got the easy opponents," Kyle complained. "... Yanno, in addition to being a prettyboy, you`re also a fething dolt," Mark stated dryly. "Eh?" The other asked. "You`re in a Blade Liger, moron. You have a shield," Mark pointed out dimly, squeezing the trigger and sending a half a dozen well placed shots into the Dibison`s back mounted missile launcher, hitting pay dirt with two of the shots and detonating half of the Zoid`s arsenal in a chain reaction that knocked the Zoid right down onto it`s stomach and also killed it`s Command and Combat systems.   
  
"... I really think I`m going to start hating it when you`re right," Kyle mumbled, pulling the controls into the configuration to activate the energy shield. "Too bad for you, I`m always right."   
  
A few seconds passed and the sound of two screaming Rev Raptors lit into Mark`s ears, followed by a pair of flaming crashes in the distance while the Blade Liger slid to a stop on all fours, it`s shield promptly vanishing and it`s blades tucking back into the main body.   
  
** "The winner is... The Suicide Team!" **  
  
"Hey Judge!"   
  
** "Thomas Orwell, Rev Raptor."   
  
** "**_HAH!_**"   
  
"... Bastard son of a hyena and an insurance salesman."   
  
  
Harabec smirked, leaning against the counter a bit heavier now as the fourth sub-match ended. It was almost like looking into a timewarped mirror given how popular battle mode 0138 was back during the initial weeks of his career. People seemed to enjoy battles against massive odds far more back then. Now? They still did, they just prefered far more stipulations than a basic chainmatch could ever provide.   
  
"Still watching the battle, eh?" One of the waiters asked, pausing his work long enough to get an itch at his shin. "Yeah. This next one`ll tell how the rest of the fights`ll probably go," Harabec answered knowingly, the sound of experience echoing through as he shifted onto his other foot, leering over at the green haired blur of movement currently pulling double the usual load with minimal effort and a slightly annoyed twitch whenever anyone wasn`t looking.   
  
"Can tell Abbie`s not too amused," he muttered before turning back to the television.   
  
  
"That brings it to four `n O for the Suicide Team. After several initial squash victories against opponents pegged to defeat both of the reckless warriors, they`re up against some of the rising stars of Zoid battles in the Bastard Team. Named for the old Hand and a Half Swords of the Imperial Army - also known as Bastard Swords - the Bastard Team have already amassed a nice win streak of ten in a row, and, with all three members piloting highly customized Saber Tigers, well known for their own crazed tactics. It really does look like we`re in for a spectacular conclusion to the Suicide Team`s first quarter of their four day promise to make it to Class A and battle the Fluegel Team by the end of the week!"   
  
"... You know, it takes a special kind of..."   
  
"Insanity?" Naomi asked. "No, that`s not the right word," Leon replied. "Stupidity?" Brad asked. "Close but still doesn`t fit right..."   
  
"Intense hatred of any form of rational thought?" Naomi asked dryly. "Yeah. Definately takes something like that to be willing to fight through twenty battles in four days... They won`t even be able to properly maintain their Zoids in time for the battle," Leon stated. "Or get much sleep for that matter, especially if they have to make repairs after the battles," Brad pointed out. "In other words, they`re both screwed even if they do win," Naomi bluntly concluded.   
  
"Pretty much," Leon replied. "Anyone want any popcorn?" He asked. "Just don`t blow up the microwave," Brad ordered, trying to be a bit of a gentleman for Naomi. For what it was worth, he only left her an opening to get a jab in on her own team mate. "Again."   
  
"... Gee, the faith you two have in my cooking abilities amazes me..."   
  
"Normal people don`t burn water to an actual crisp."   
  
"I`m not _that_ bad, am I?"   
  
"Worse," Naomi replied.   
  
"... Oh come on... Brad, you`ve tasted my cooking before, is it _really_ that bad?" Leon asked.   
  
"A wise man once said to never disagree with a redhead," Brad replied. "... Traitor," Leon grumbled.   
  
  
**"Battle mode 0138, the Bastard Team versus the Suicide Team, sub-match five of five! Ready?"**   
  
The constant bickering between Kyle and Marcus instantly came to a complete end as the three Saber Tigers dropped into view, literally diving out of a Whale King to land no less than a hundred yards from them, with two automatically focusing on either member of the Suicide Team and the third merely shifting around.   
  
The three Zoids lived up to their name, two had mounted gigantic, fixed blades onto the sides of their Saber Tigers, along with missile boxes on their backs, while the third mounted what looked like a gigantic ring around it`s main body, just beneath the jawline, with a singular, buzzsaw-type blade extending on the outer surface of the ring. It added to this arsenal with a fixed bolt gun on it`s back, making it especially lethal compared to even a Blade Liger Simulacrum. It also had a weird looking pod behind the bolt gun, though the pilot wasn`t making any moves to reveal just that that pod might have been.   
  
"... Guess our opponents just stopped being pushovers," Kyle stated. "Hit `em at range," Mark replied. "Eh?"   
  
"You`ve got sniper guns, don`t you?"   
  
"... For a newbie, you`re more observant than you act," Kyle replied, instantly wheeling the Blade Liger around and trying to get a suitable distance away to snipe at the other team, only to come to a screeching halt as several explosions sounded in front of him. "So much for that," he muttered, the Zoid turning around and practically glaring at one of the two first Saber Tigers, which still had smoke trailing out of a missile port. "Scatter Bombs," he stated darkly. "They came ready for a fight," he added.   
  
"Then let`s give them one," Mark replied, the Fox`s dual impact cannon dropping out of it`s hiding compartment as the Judge finally spoke up again.   
  
** "_FIGHT!_"**  
  
Just as the bell rang, the Fox let loose, spraying off pulse lasers at one of the Saber Tigers, which dodged in an artful fashion, corkscrewing through the air before unleashing three of it`s six missiles in a blistering hail toward the ground based Zoid. Mark grit his teeth and the Shadow Fox shrieked that synthetic war cry it had before dashing forward, narrowly escaping the Tiger`s attack only to flip open it`s tail-mounted missile launcher, sending off the shot with perfect timing.   
  
One electromagnetic net and a loud crack of electronics exploding later, the first member of the Bastard Team was out, his Zoid entangled in a net on the ground, his systems completely fried out of commission for the remainder of the battle.   
  
"Guess you Bastards aren`t as tough as you act, eh?" Mark asked.   
  
"That had to be the _lamest_ pun you have _ever_ made."   
  
"Just shut up, Chinny," Marcus grumbled. "You`re both _idiots_," one of the remaining Saber Tiger pilots growled - Mark would have guessed it was the one who promptly attacked him, but he was a bit too busy to be distracted in such a way.   
  
That left the Buzzsaw Tiger to Kyle, who grit his teeth accordingly and then launched forward with a loud yell. The Ivory Blade Liger had to barrel roll in mid-air though, barely avoiding the aptly named Ring of Death around the Tiger by scraping along on it`s back, only to literally flip over thanks to it`s blades, which then opened fire in an instant.   
  
The other pilot wasn`t a pushover though, skidding around and then letting out a laugh over the comm, just as Kyle`s shots slammed into a pinkish burst of shield energy, which continued to expand outward like a wall, smacking into the Blade Liger head-on and throwing it back onto it`s hind legs until the Zoid activated it`s own shield, brutishly plowing into the wave of the other, which faded after a short while. "Crash Shield Pod, custom edition," the other pilot informed proudly. "... You`re team name isn`t that wrong after all, you Bastard..."   
  
"Who`s the one cracking lame puns now, _huh_?!" Marcus interrupted, utterly shattering the mood that Kyle was going for. "... Oh, will you just shut up already?!"   
  
The Fox shrieked again as the Saber Tiger dashed by, missing by inches with it`s right blade. In seconds though, the fighting would end for the attacker, and both Zoid and pilot were going to make very sure of it. The Saber Tiger whipped around at full speed and the Fox was ready and waiting for it, darting forward at the same speed, though it`s right forepaw was just a bit slower to move than it`s left.   
  
"Strike Laser Claw!" Mark yelled, keying into the audio controls that had replaced the complex patterns of movement in place for most older Zoids, causing the right forepaw to begin glowing, followed by the left a few seconds later as the two combatants closed in on one another. The Saber Tiger pilot smirked though, spotting what Mark intended to do with the skill of a veteran, or someone who thought he was a veteran at the least.   
  
Closer the two came.   
  
Closer still and then, finally, the Fox made it`s attack, but it proved that while the Saber Tiger pilot might have been a studious veteran in his own right, Marcus was a crazed, unpredictable rookie, stabbing the right foreclaw of the Fox right into the ground with enough force to set the entire weight of the Zoid onto the right forearm, which then sprang back at full force, just as the thrusters in the back of the left hind leg kicked in, vectored upward at just the right angle while the opposite thrusters on it`s right hind leg vectored downward just enough to send the Zoid into a hard corkscrew, just as it`s left claw lit up even brighter than the right, slamming into the Saber Tiger`s chin and slagging it`s jaw shut before tearing through it`s right shoulder, decapitating the arm and crashing down onto the right blade as the Fox got to it`s feet, torking the Saber Tiger onto it`s back in a near-Judo-like slam.   
  
To put it bluntly, the Shadow Fox had just pimp smacked the Saber Tiger like it was nothing, all but humiliating it, and it`s pilot, in the same move. It also wasn`t exactly shy about screeching out it`s cry of victory, deafening and more than _little_ grating on even Mark`s ears.   
  
The Liger on the other hand, was busy dodging around at a furious pace, trailed by explosions as metallic bolts slammed into the ground in a stream behind it, continuously coming closer and close to actually hitting it until finally it stopped, with the Zoid finding itself knocked off of it`s feet from a shield ram, literally telegraphed close to three hundred and fifty yards, throwing the Ivory Blade Liger for a loop with a dozen or more burn marks scarring it`s normally perfect finish to a near charred black tone at each point as a result.   
  
"Damn it," Kyle growled, bringing his Zoid back up with an annoyed expression. "If not for that pod, I`d be able to trash him in a few seconds..."   
  
"Looks like we`re splittin` this one," Mark cut in, just as two explosions tore the aforementioned pod - along with the bolt gun - right off of the Saber Tiger`s back, sending the Zoid staggering to the side briefly.   
  
"Fair trade," Kyle stated dryly, swinging his blades forward over the head, then pulling the triggers on each joystick. In machine gun fashion, the Saber Tiger stumbled back with each impact, explosions ripping out chunks of armor and severing vital connections in limbs, even blowing off parts of external stabilizer units and shattering the plexiglass covering of the right eyepiece of the Zoid, but most importantly shattering the connections of the forward part of the Buzzsaw.   
  
Defiantly though, the Saber Tiger continued standing, it`s pilot screaming angrily.   
  
At least it _was_ standing.   
  
Then it was virtually impaled down the throat by the Liger`s right blade, which glowed a fiery shade of gold as it stabbed through, cutting into the other Zoid until it was mere inches from piercing the outer shell of the Zoid Core, missing the cockpit by an equal distance. The battle was clearly, emphatically and certifiably _over_ as a result.   
  
And the winners were also just as clear.   
  
** "Battle over! Battle over! The winner is... The Suicide Team!"   
  
** "Nice move, Chinny" Mark stated smugly. "Not bad yourself, Newbie," Kyle replied, allowing the Liger to step back and un-impale the Saber Tiger a bit more with each step, finally drawing it`s blade entirely out and swinging it back into neutral, just as the Saber Tiger collapsed in a jumbled heap.   
  
  
"Guess they`ve got a blazing chance in Hell after all," Naomi admitted with a vague hint of amusement. "Agreed. Now all we have to do is wait and see if they can hold it together long enough to make it through the rest of their matches," Leon said with just a hint of something undefined in his voice. "Is that want I`m hearing in there?" Brad asked amusedly. "Maybe, but not from me," Leon cryptically replied as the Red Blade Liger roared outside, for whatever reason it had to do so.   
  
One could almost taste the competition in Leon`s gaze as he watched the Ivory Blade Liger like a hawk.   
  
  
"One down, three to go," Harabec said to himself, turning away from the television and relieving the cashier for the time being. He never really bothered taking note of the doors swinging open once more though, as a man of average height stepped inside the resturaunt. He didn`t look terribly out of place of course, those plain brown eyes set towards a clear objective, the heat-caused scar covering a large portion of the right side of his face standing out like a black dot amid a white background.   
  
His objective was almost painfully abvious though, at least to someone who could see the scene from a reasonable distance to analyze things.   
  
Stepping around several people and positioning himself just right, he allowed a green haired waitress to smack into him, knowingly finding spilled food and drink as one part of the act, but ending up with a far greater reward as he put his hands to the shoulders of the annoyed, angry looking woman with a too nice smile.   
  
"I`m sorry ma`am... My name is Aram," he stated pleasantly. Abbie growled ferally. "Lovely. _Move_," she ordered, harshly shoving the man out of the way and almost sending him off of his feet as a result, storming towards the kitchen with an irate look about her.   
  
Aram merely smirked the smirk of the obsessed and headed for the exit.   
  


_ End Chapter Twenty-One  
  


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_

**Author`s Note:** Sorry posting this up took so long :P Massive bouts with laziness, other projects and writer`s block.  
  
And for anyone who noticed: Any minor inconsistencies with the Packard Team **will** be ironed out. I only caught it after it was too late to fix without re-writing a sizable chunk of the chapter, so... I improvised >_>;  
  
**Zinou:** Yes. Jamie has a **lot** of trouble :P Unfortunately, he won`t be able to sort it out `til I get the focus back on the Blitz Team. As for Kyle and Mark... Think they were bad this chapter? Just wait. It gets worse. *Cackles insanely.*  
  
**EndlessAdventure:** Not often, trust me. Things are going to be picking up before the end... Rather violently no doubt. As for Leyon, he showed up not too long ago and he`ll show up again pretty soon, in a **most** unexpected way. *Cackles insanely, once again.*  
  
**ZeonReborn:** ... *Eats all of Zeon`s cookies.* ... *Belch.* :D  
  
**Milana Pashmina:** Sorry `bout Harabec, but take heart that he doesn`t really show up all that much for the most part :P  
  
**Shiro:** Depends on your point of view. _Jamie_ could technically be considered a virgin, if you ignore the fact that someone else happened to be using his body at the time. The Wild Eagle is the one who did the deed, he and one of Leyla`s other two apparent personalities(wonder who actually noticed the whole 'three reflections' thing?).  
  
**true platinum man:** Depends on if they even find out. And I happen to have a twisted little... twist involving the whole family lines thing, but I`ll let you fester in curiosity rather than telling you >_> Zinou probably knows whats coming, but oh well...  
  
And also for anyone else who noticed: William Edgars is the name of a character on Babylon 5. Surprised no one`s pointed out any of the random things like that :P  
  
Expect the next chapter in two days, see ya then! Enjoy and see ya next time! Sh33p out. 


	23. Points of Authority

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I do not own Zoids.  
  


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** New Age  
**_ Points of Authority  
_

  
"Forfeit the game, before somebody else  
Takes you out of the frame, and puts your name to shame  
Cover up your face, you can`t run the race  
The pace is too fast, you just won`t last..."  
  
  
Vega Obscura. By most accounts, of those few who actually knew him, he was a normal boy, had a bit of trouble on math but technically a genius in every way. Highly creative, a could-have-been prodigy in both art and literature, a natural at Zoid piloting for more reasons than one and someone who grew bored with most hobbies and jobs fairly quickly because he could master most of them on the first try. On the flip side of the coin though, he was also a sometimes ruthless, highly skilled tracker, a lethally skilled warrior for as many reasons as he was merely a natural at it, and to end the package, he had mastered two black belts in Helic martial arts and could fence no less than eight styles of Imperial swordsmanship with the best of them like it was nothing.   
  
To add fuel to this fire, the boy also lacked much apprehension about killing. He had seen people die before, he had killed some himself, by accident _and_ design as it were. Further more, the boy wasn`t a tracker in the conventional sense, tracking a foe through foot steps and other such things took far too long.   
  
As such, Vega had tailored his old 'hobby' of hacking into the Backdraft computers into tracking the movements of certain people through everything from credit cards and checks to the individual signatures of Zoid cores - a trick he had learned during his admittedly brief time working with Doctor Leyon just after the finding of the Berserk Fury. He also used this talent to hack through the mainframes of international news agencies, and other... More notable groups.   
  
One such group was the world wide peacekeeping intelligence/military organization known as the Guardian Force. Their systems had been the toughest so far, but given how he had slipped in completely undetected within two and a half minutes, that wasn`t really saying much.   
  
_ "Obscura, Obscura, Obscura... Where is Obscura?"_ He thought to himself, scanning through the entire computer system and searching for the files on anyone with the last name Obscura.   
  
Eventually, he found what he was looking for. A single gigantic folder marked off as 'Obscura,' with 'Obscura, Kale' located within. It only took a few seconds from there as Vega went to work again, pausing only to sip on his drink while downloading the files and then exiting the Guardian Force`s systems, covering his tracks with every dirty trick in the book, along with about fifteen that hadn`t even been written in yet.   
  
When it was over, he was left with a complete bio of Kale, a list of recent activities and everything that they would charge him with if he was ever caught alive, which was an impossible long shot in and of itself given how many task forces and individual pilots Kale had apparently taken out along the way. It was sickening and outright disturbing for Vega to watch as his hunch from almost a month earlier was proven right.   
  
Kale was following a specific pattern, running like a seismographic needle with the pattern of kills matching up with portions of a grid that corresponded to high or low ranking members of the Backdraft Group. The highest point so far had been Altiel, the lowest had been one of the mechanics for the Five Kings program, and the pattern had already doubled back once. That meant that there were deaths that the public didn`t know about, a bad thing indeed.   
  
At the present, Kale`s seismic pattern was at a mid-way point, climbing upward on an imprecise angle that would probably carry it somewhere into one of three targets. Altiel and Sarah had been of equal rank during the weeks near the end of the Backdraft Group, and above them was a shadowy fellow that Vega knew only as the Count. Above the Count was the Commitee of Seven, people who kept their identities completely hidden from any and all attempts at ferreting them out. The Commitee had also been the only notable portion of the organization to escape being arrested for trying to overthrow a national past time that was as important to the governments as it was to the people.   
  
Kale`s course meant that he was on a byline for Sarah or for the Count, Vega didn`t know which. The Count was located at a fairly comfortable prison located within the borders of the Helic Republic, that meant that Kale would have to either be subtle or punch through border patrols, and Vega knew that Kale honestly didn`t care either way.   
  
That left their mother`s prison. Sarah Obscura was being held at a women`s prison located near the edge of the Imperial border with the zone designated for Zoid battles, putting it close to a day`s time from Kale`s last known sighting.   
  
The choice was clear by then, Kale was going to try and hit their mother next.   
  
Vega was going to be waiting for him.   
  
  
"I can already tell that this is gonna be one o` those days," Mark groaned with a yawn, reclining back as far as he could in the rigid cockpit seating. "Isn`t my fault we had to stay up fixing damage and rearming that damned launcher," Kyle grumbled back, audily trying to scratch his head only to find that his finger became stuck in a knot. "... Damn it," he muttered.   
  
"Thus you see the joy in being me... I am not a pretty boy, thus _I_ don`t need an hour brushing my hair!" Mark shouted, just as the Fox growled out something akin to an insult at the Liger, which merely snorted in reply. "... Silence or I stab you with my chin."   
  
"I have so much shit left to talk that my corpse would just keep going anyway."   
  
"Such is the joy of ear plugs."   
  
"Did I mention that I`d probably bleed in your hair?"   
  
"**_YOU BASTARD!_**" Kyle screamed, only to scream again when he literally yanked his finger free of the knot, coming close to yanking some of his hair out as a result. Marcus was too busy cackling like a sleep deprived mad man to try and further his insults though, and the two Zoids were both exchanging wits at a furious pace as the Judge Capsule slammed down in the distance.   
  
  
"Yesterday they aced through the Serpentine, Faren, Orwell and Bastard Teams. Unfortunately, the Packard Team - who they were originally scheduled to fight first - was forced to forfeit due to unknown circumstances, keeping the two man team with all five of their first promised wins. Today though, the Suicide Team will be dealing with far tougher opponents. The yet-to-be defeated Devestator Team, recently returning from a one year hiatus, the newly formed Orion and Wolverine Teams, the Aralina Team and the new Class B champions, the Tigers Team! Due to circumstance though, the Tigers will not be defending their title, primarily because battle mode 0138 - the chain match - would tip the balance too much for or against them for it to be fair for a title defense."   
  
"Circumstance saves the day," Naomi tiredly commented, bending the sleep induced cramp out of her back as Brad leaned up off the couch, a snoring Leon basically camped out in the nearby chair. "I see you to were up late studying them," Naomi observed slyly, having long since figured out Leon and Brad`s habits when it came to both studying a possible future opponent`s battles and when it came to actually sleeping at a sane hour. "I blame the coffee... Wasn`t my usual type," Brad grumbled. "Sure it wasn`t," Naomi replied, wandering over and affectionately scruffing the former mercenary`s already messy hair.   
  
  
"Devestator Team?" Mark asked. "Yeah, they all use decked out Iron Kongs and favor turning battlefields into char broiled mush rather than precisely trying to hit someone. Brutal in the short term but if we can outlast their missile supply, we`ll probably be able to make short work of them," Kyle answered. "So you _weren`t_ looking at trailer parts last night..."   
  
"I learned to study my opponents after the beating you gave me."   
  
"A newbie brutalized you."   
  
"A newbie who I owned like the bitch he is."   
  
"A newbie who still brutalized you."   
  
"Shut up, Newbie," Kyle grumbled. "Your mom," Mark shot back. "Is a very nice, chaste lady who calls me once a week and hasn`t looked sideways at another man since my father died," Kyle finished with a mocking tone. "You must have forgotten that she`s also a weekly stripper."   
  
"You _would_ know about strippers, wouldn`t you?" Kyle asked. "Bah," Mark sputtered with an annoyed tone. "Meh," Kyle replied. "Bah."   
  
"Meh."   
  
"Bah."   
  
"Meh."   
  
"**_YEAH TOAST!!!_**" Mark blurted out. "... Gee, somebody didn`t get enough sleep last night, did he?" Kyle asked. "... Can it or I`ll file your chin off with sandpaper."   
  
"So you`re the Suicide Team, eh?" A new voice, burly and somewhat hauty interrupted, coinciding with the appearance of four Iron Kongs, two of which were practically covered in missile launchers, the other two of which had enough beam cannon-type weaponry to hose down the average battalion like nothing.   
  
"Gee, compensating for something?" Kyle asked dryly. "Yeah, really... Must be all the steroids," Mark interjected amusedly. "Big talk coming from a pair of idiots," the other stated with a tinge of his own amusement. "Bubba," Mark growled. "No dude, Bertha," Kyle replied. "Bertha? Why Bertha?" Mark asked. "Because it`s _obvious_ that these guys would probably get a sick kick out of a masculine, redneck name like Bubba," Kyle answered. "Bertha it is then," Mark replied.   
  
"... What in the _hell_ kind of crack are you two smoking?"   
  
"Your mom`s," Mark answered calmly. "... Rimshot man, cheap and brutal," Kyle stated. "Yes well... It had to be done, right?" Mark asked. "True, true..."   
  
"... Hey Judge! Start the match so we can take these assholes out already!"   
  
"You _would_ know about taking out assholes, wouldn`t you?" Mark asked contemptuously. "You talk too much shit," a second member of the Devestator Team stated dully. "Only because it`s all he can do," the apparent leader reassured. "All I can do, eh?" Mark asked with that sadistically exhausted, utterly laughable tone present in any young man deprived of sleep after having spent close to ten hours doing heavy labor with absolutely _no_ help in the process.   
  
"You got the Newbie riled..."   
  
Mark growled like an animal.   
  
"You shouldn`t have done that..."   
  
** "The area within a five mile radius is a designated Zoid Battlefield. Only competitors and personnel have authorized entry into the battlefield. All others must leave the area at once! Area scanned... Battlefield set up. The Suicide Team versus the Devestator Team. Battle Mode 0138. Ready..." **  
  
"... You`re both absolute idiots..."   
  
"I weep for you. Really, I do," Kyle mocked as Marcus spat out several random insults, jumbled horribly to the extent that they couldn`t really be understood, into the comm.   
  
** "_FIGHT!_"   
  
** "... Whatever," the leader muttered annoyedly. "Take `em out!" He ordered loudly.   
  
The two Missile Kongs both dove behind their counterparts, moving into rear guard positions while the two Beam Kongs rumbled forward, spraying out shots at both the Fox and the Liger, the latter of which merely stood it`s ground with it`s shield up at full. The Shadow Fox on the other hand, was moving by the time the Devestators had even begun to open fire, rocketing forward at full speed with a loud shriek and opening up with it`s dual impact cannon.   
  
The Kong it hit didn`t even budge an inch from the hits it took, all of which barreled right into it`s thicky built right shoulder, coming just beneath the beam cannon that was mounted there.   
  
"... Definately compensating for something."   
  
"Must be damn small, huh?"   
  
"Probably small enough to qualify as an 'innie.'"   
  
"... Will you two just shut up and fight?!" Another Devestator demanded as a salvo of missiles passed over the two forward Kongs, streaking in with a whistling scream of brutalized atmosphere, heading on a direct course for the Ivory Blade Liger, which growled at the coming onslaught in feral amusement. It was only by scant seconds that the Zoid dropped it`s shield, needlessly of course, before abruptly dodging through the raging wall of firepower, zipping along at full speed after the Shadow Fox.   
  
Then came a fierce shriek of tortured metal as the first Iron Kong tumbled over, rolling backwards from the full impact of every single spare ton behind the weight of the Shadow Fox, already moving at full speed as the collision took place.   
  
"Warned you not to piss off the Newbie, but did you listen? _Noooo_," Kyle groaned, nonchalantly using the remaining Beam Kong like a spring board in his approach towards the two Missile Kongs at the back of the newly breaking formation. It was at about the same time that the Shadow Fox rose back up and away from the Iron Kong, which was already getting back up to it`s feet and bearing out the superficial damage it had taken. Claw marks, eight of them in all, lashed across the chest of the huge Zoid, which rumbled angrily at it`s smaller attacker.   
  
"... So maybe you actually have some power backing that stupidity, no skill though," the leader stated dryly. "No skill? Dear Bertha, I just punked your sorry ass out, and I`ll do it again just to prove my point!"   
  
"... You just don`t know when to listen, do you?" Kyle asked blandly, twisting the Blade Liger down and avoiding another pair of missiles in the process, a trio of beams coming in from behind and just barely missing. "They`re named the Devestator Team, what do you expect? Schubaltz-level intelligence?" Mark asked, swiftly dodging the Shadow Fox through a blistering hail of plasma, taking several small grazing hits in the process.   
  
"Point taken, but still," Kyle replied, nonchalantly swinging both blades forward and stabbing one of the Missile Kongs right in the bends of the forearms, then swiftly sinking the Ivory Blade Liger`s longest teeth right into the huge Zoid`s leg, going for the vulnerable spot where the knee joint connected to the thigh. It wasn`t long before the first Devestator went crashing down as Kyle brought the blades back and extended them out to either side, breaking the connections for the forearms and the biceps of the Iron Kong, sending the top-heavy Zoid to rapidly begin losing it`s balance, which wasn`t helped when Kyle fired up the shield to hold the Kong in place while the Blade Liger literally tore it`s leg loose and bit it in two while the rest of the Zoid slid along on the energy shield, crashing to the ground next to the Ivory Blade Liger.   
  
Blades folded up, the shield dropped and Kyle let out a smirk.   
  
"You were saying something about us being unskilled?" He asked, even as the other Beam Kong fumbled back, dozens of sparks flashing off of it`s head and several of it`s main guns tearing off under the onslaught of pulse lasers, half of which were going in at angles calculated to hit joints, the other half obviously being Mark`s semi-improved aim, which was still a bit sloppy but obviously still very lucky, as displayed by the amount of damage all of the shots were causing.   
  
And then the Fox stopped, swinging it`s gun back into forward-only and lunging forward, the ground behind it exploding in a violent fireball from close to thirty missiles at once as the smaller Zoid tore through the empty space between itself and the Iron Kong like a bat out of Hell, an image not exactly helped by how the Shadow Fox instinctively began deploying it`s smoke dischargers while Mark charged up the Strike Laser Claws.   
  
"Nobody ever listens to the random bishounen... Such a shame," Kyle stated, blandly dodging a pair of missiles and putting a number of machinegun-styled blaster shots into the groin of one of the Missile Kongs, blowing it`s lower body right off due to the severe lack of armor there. That had always been a key weakness among Iron Kongs, but only a few people thought enough to actually exploit it.   
  
As for Mark?   
  
"**_STRIKE LASER CLAW!!!_**"   
  
The remaining Beam Kong let out a roar, the majority of it`s the upper right side of it`s chest, the lower right side of it`s neck and all of it`s right shoulder promptly being severed by the smoking blur that was the Shadow Fox, which landed with a harsh skid, smoke dischargers folding back up while the enormous Zoid behind it twisted and toppled over, out of the battle due to the damage it had taken.   
  
"You were saying something about _me_ being unskilled?" Marcus asked rather dryly, flipping open the tail of the Shadow Fox and nailing the remaining Kong with an air of annoying calm and relaxation. The pilot screamed irately and pounded his fists, but it was useless. The remaining Kong shut down entirely and...   
  
** "Battle over! Battle over! The winner is... The Suicide Team!" **  
  
  
"I`m back!" Bit announced cheerfully, waltzing into the living room like he owned the place. Leena was camped out on the couch with a dozen empty bags of what had been popcorn set on the floor next to her, Jamie was muttering obscenities to himself in what looked vaguely similar to sleep and Steve and Brad were nowhere in sight.   
  
"Gee," he began sardonically. "Just roll out the ol` welcome mat, why don`t ya?" He asked dimly, glancing up from the two unconcious teens and setting his sights on the television, just as the winner of the first phase of the five part battle was announced. The blonde youth quirked a brow up at the sight of the Shadow Fox and a slightly-large white Blade Liger standing side by side as a number of Gustavs literally scraped away the remains of four Iron Kongs.   
  
"Guess Harlock`s doing alright," he thought aloud, glancing around briefly before shrugging to himself and heading into the kitchen. Immediately, his eyes set themselves onto the fridge, and in his usual fervor, Bit launched himself through about twelve feet of empty space to try and latch onto it, only to find that it was completely empty save for a single note.   
  
"... Can`t these lazy bums even shop for groceries when I`m gone?!" He demanded mournfully. So much food had been there... And someone else had eaten it all!   
  
_ "Wait a sec,"_ he thought, finally noticing the little piece of chilled paper, which layer across an unopened, empty tupperware bowl. From the looks of things, it was from the Doc, and it read rather plainly as well.   
  


_ As they say, "Duty calls." I had to go away for a few days  
on business leave. Keep the place as tidy as you can and try  
to avoid any calls from a guy named 'Sloan Tendro.' If  
you need me, you know the number for the jeep I took.  
- The Doc  
  
_

"... Sheesh, are we _all_ on business leave these days?" Bit asked, absentmindedly remembering that Leena was actually out of the hospital now. She`d apparently been released during his own little trip around the block from the look of things, though he hadn`t made note of much else about her. Like the fact that she was wearing pajamas with sleeves and pant legs rather than the usual skimpy get-up she favored.   
  
He also hadn`t noticed the pair of glasses that`d been placed next to the couch.   
  
  
"And just where do you think _you`re_ going, _Vegie_?" The male member of the Fury`s support crew demanded. Vega had recently managed to identify him by the last name of 'Torson,' but had no freaking clue of anything else about him. "To put a stop to something I`ve been neglecting lately. What armor is the Fury wearing?" Vega asked, already knowing the answer though. "The Storm Armor, why?"   
  
"Good. I`ll need some speed to get there," Vega stated, walking past the man like nothing and mentally calling out, using his emotions to coax the Fury into walking out of the hangar they`d kept it in lately.   
  
** I don`t like this. Why can`t we go back home? **  
  
"We will soon enough, Fury. Just have to let them finish figuring you out," Vega assured as the Zoid lowered it`s head, obediently opening the way into the cockpit, much to Torson`s vehement protests.   
  
"What am I supposed to tell Stigma?!"   
  
"Tell him I left. He`ll understand," Vega answered, jumping inside without another word.   
  
  
** "The Suicide Team versus the Orion Team! Battle mode 0138. Ready? _FIGHT!_" **  
  
It was a far more even match-up than the previous had been, at least in numbers. Two against two, the Ivory Blade Liger and the Shadow Fox against a Shield Liger and a Command Wolf. Numerically speaking, things looked as though they really could have hit a complete deadlock from the start of the battle to it`s end, but then again, numbers only accounted for how many Zoids were present.   
  
The actual battle proved to be far shorter. The Command Wolf was outgunned right from the start, having it`s shoulders blown open with a stream of pulse lasers right as the bell rang, but the Shield Liger proved a tougher opponent, mainly since the pilot had the sense to throw his shield up from the start of the battle while trying to ram the Blade Liger, which also had it`s shield up for similar reasons.   
  
The result was that the two shields canceled each other out and both Zoids slammed into each other at nearly full speed, with the slightly heavier weight of the Blade Liger causing the Shield Liger to stumble backwards before things degenerated into a biting and clawing melee. Sparks flew from the cheek of the Blade Liger as an errant paw strike came in, narrowly missing the actual cockpit, but the Shield Liger rocked back from having the ivory Zoid`s shoulder smashed into it, which also changed when Kyle sank his Liger`s teeth in and -   
  
"Game, set, match."   
  
- promptly tore the front right shoulder`s armoring right off, exposing internal gears which were promptly smashed to burnt kiblets by a single pair of shots from his dual impact cannon, causing the Shield Liger to topple over sideways and stay that way.   
  
** "Battle over! Battle over! The winner is... The Suicide Team!"   
  
** "Surgical," Mark commented dully, leaning back in the cockpit chair and yawning. "Guess you`re trying to finish this as quickly as me, eh?"   
  
"The longer these fights go on, the more damage we`ll take and the less sleep and food we`ll be able to get as a result. The less sleep and food we get and the more damage we have to work through means our Zoids will be weaker if we make it through to Class A, and the slower and sloppier our piloting will be," Kyle explained with all the logic of a computer. "Point taken," Mark replied with another yawn.   
  
  
"Interesting," Leon commented studiously, practically ignoring the way that Naomi and Brad were carrying on with each other. Despite the fact that most of the time, they were quiet, now that they had gotten significantly closer through the past weeks, you could put them together and - as Leon Tauros was more than willing to testify to - they wouldn`t shut up.   
  
But at least they paused in their typical morning debate of coffee versus tea long enough to quirk a mutual eyebrow at him.   
  
"What?" Naomi asked, blandly taking note of how Leon had yet to even look at the two. That was probably one of the man`s key mixing points. When focused, he literally ignored _everything_ but the goal he had set for himself and things that coincided with it. This meant that he was extremely dedicated but it also carried the downside that he came off as somewhat secretive and maybe even a bit more jaded than Brad and Naomi both at the same time.   
  
"Did you see that just now?" He asked after a small pause. "See what?" Brad asked, pointing out the obvious fact that he and Naomi hadn`t even been paying attention. "The Liger pilot`s style just changed. So did the Shadow Fox pilot."   
  
"How so?" Naomi asked, finally leering at the TV as Gustavs started dragging off the downed Zoids of the Orion Team.   
  
"The Fox pilot just became less willing to go point blank when that was his best chance to take out the Command Wolf and the Liger pilot just became quicker and more precise. They`ve finally realized that they aren`t dealing with a game so they`re trying to cut back on risks where they can, or to end any risks they have to take as quickly as possible," Leon observed.   
  
"They`re still sloppy enough," Brad pointed out, noting the amount of damage that had been taken to the heads and shoulders of either Zoid.   
  
  
No man`s land, just a few hundred miles south of the Guylos border with the zone of land permanently assigned to the Zoid Battle Commission and the Guardian Force. Most of the time, this was land that was reserved for battle, and it was only occupied sparsely in the area that a fugitive was making his camp. Close to 280 years earlier, this place was the site of a battle that had come close to determining the outcome of one of the last of the three Imperial-Republican Wars, a place where then Lieutenant James R. Kreuger lead a squadron of prototype Shield Ligers and thirty Gordos, lacking on any air support whatsoever, to a forced victory after the death of his commanding officer, successfully becoming the only man to ever outsmart General Alfred Schubaltz, the uncle of the brothers Karl and Thomas.   
  
That was almost 280 years ago.   
  
Today, the place was still littered with scavenged, demolished Zoids, barren of their cores, barren as well of their now badly obsolescent weaponry and equally obsolescent armor. All that was left of what had once been close to eighty-eight fallen, then top-of-the-line combat Zoids were skeletal remains, battered shells of what had been, and what was left of that was generally half-covered in sand and desert growth, with a few playing host to the occasional wild animal.   
  
It was a place filled with ghosts of the past, hundreds had died there for a war that only beget two more in it`s aftermath and lead the emperor, Rudolph Gerhard Zeppellin I into believing that the Republic was too dangerous to be allowed to grow. Because of that, the battle had been utterly futile.   
  
Kale Obscura considered the futility of that event to be something funny in an off sort of way. His sense of humor had been broken like the rest of his now cracked, murderous psyche when he`d gone over the edge, so to find something like a futile, bloody and otherwise desperate battle that accomplished nothing but further bloodshed was something that highly amused him.   
  
Almost as much as the faint growling of the Genosaurer. Apparently, the huge Zoid found it annoying to have to sit around so many 'dead' members of it`s kind, if only because they couldn`t give it a fight.   
  
_ "Almost time,"_ he thought to himself, taking a sip from his cantine and then checking his watch. _"Vega`s probably figured my pattern out by now. He`s also probably heading on a byline for where mommy-dearest is being held by the Guardian Force. If the broadcasts the Genosaurer`s been able to pick up on broadband lately are correct, he`s also probably using the Storm Fury,"_ he mused, and then paused to look up and around.   
  
A loud rumble overhead and he could faintly see the outline of a Whale King. Civilian transport, obviously, otherwise the area would`ve been coated in artillery by now, along with attack Zoids flying in overhead.   
  
_ "He`ll probably be waiting on me at the prison, as well. All the more reason for me to change my plans. Trouble is, he`s also probably had the forethought to warn both of my targets. If he hasn`t, he told someone who told Stoller and Stoller gave them the warning. That means that they`ll be expecting me regardless, which also means I`ll probably end up having to take either target out from a distance."   
  
_ Another pause.   
  
_ "I`ll trash Vega then. Whether or not I kill her in the process doesn`t matter,"_ he resolved, leaning back against the leg of the Genosaurer and narrowing his eyes as the mid-day sun beat down hard.   
  
  
** "The Suicide Team versus the Wolverine Team! Battle mode 0138. Ready?" **  
  
"We _will_ win this!" A member of the Wolverines exclaimed.   
  
"Your mom _will_ play the skin flute," Mark shot back. "Hey!"   
  
"Ouch," Kyle commented dryly. "The truth is always painful, isn`t it?" Mark asked.   
  
** "Fight!"   
  
** "Yep," Kyle answered, kicking off the match in the same fashion that the last one had ended, precision piloting. He wasn`t the best, but he was improving rapidly, dodging through a dozen incoming shots before extending the blades of the Ivory Liger out and slicing straight through two of the three Wolverine Team Zoids, splitting each of the two Saber Tigers right down the middle of the jawline to the hind end of both Zoid, each exploding in the same instant as he came skidding to a halt.   
  
"Tod! Mel!"   
  
"_Mommy_," the other member of the Suicide Team harshly mocked, just as the remaining Saber Tiger literally went to pieces, a pair of golden blurs slicing in an X from either shoulder through to the back of either hip, narrowly missing the core and leaving the Zoid to split into four neatly sliced parts, held together only at the armor on the belly, though each leg promptly became detached when the Saber Tiger`s body fell straight down. The legs stood straight and then fell onto the diced up Tiger.   
  
"That was harsh, man," Kyle stated. "... Oh, like chopping two people`s Zoids in half isn`t?" Mark asked blandly. "... Point taken."   
  
** "The winner is... The Suicide Team!" **  
  
  
"I think I figured out the Fox pilot`s style," Leon said, more to himself than anyone else since Naomi and Brad were busy rambling on with each other about the best angle to shoot down a Gojulas.   
  
"He`s trying to play the psychology card and hit his opponents where they least expect it, taking each out in what should be the most uneffective weapon for the task, surprising them and overwhelming them because of it," he thought aloud.   
  
"Doesn`t occur to you that he`s probably just exhausted, huh?" Naomi asked sarcastically. "... Or that," Leon mumbled to himself amid the background noise of Brad`s near audible smirking.   
  
  
"Guess they`re either frazzed out or improving," Harabec deduced with all the shrewdness of a veteran elite trying to evaluate his competition at an upcoming tournament. People were crowded around the main televisions in the resturaunt, but Harabec still had a good view, even from behind the countertop. "I still think he`s nuts," Abbie growled, settling down onto the stool behind the counter and sighing to herself. "`Staving, I could understand, but what point is battling if he could die at any time out there?" She demanded.   
  
"You`ll see if you ever pilot a Zoid," Harabec answered patiently. "Besides, I seriously doubt many fatalities occur in legitimate, sanctioned battles anymore. They have medical staff on call, ejectors, the works," he stated. It was a nice effort to try and soothe the young woman`s edged out nerves, futile but he tried anyway. Abbie had something against Zoids, she never said why but it was obvious that she didn`t like the idea of people piloting 50+ ton war machines against each other for sheer sport.   
  
"I still think they`re all nuts," she muttered dimly.   
  
  
**"The Suicide Team versus the Aralina Team! Battle mode 0138. Ready?"**   
  
"Cracky the peon."   
  
"Owny the midget."   
  
"Weeble the wobble."   
  
"Shmeh."   
  
"What the _hell_?"   
  
"Don`t you just love it when they think we`re on crack?" Kyle asked with a sadistic snicker. "... Who said they only _think_ it?" Mark asked, snorting into the com.   
  
** "_FIGHT!_"   
  
** "These guys are insane..." One of the Aralinas muttered in disbelief. "All the more reason to end things quickly," another stated. Three against two, two Helcats with side-mounted hiblit guns and a Dark Horn with two Imperial-made hyper beam cannons, the kind typically seen on Iron Kongs.   
  
In short, things looked rather even, but as with the previous sub-matches of the day, looks were disturbingly false compared to actual results, which were quick and decidedly lethal. Explosions lit up the area around the Ivory Blade Liger, the one that most people would rightly think was both more dangerous in terms of firepower and durability, as well as the skill of the pilot.   
  
Unfortunately, that meant that all of their focus was away from the Shadow Fox. With the Blade Liger dodging around through bullets and plasma bolts, things had definately fallen onto Mark`s shoulders for the duration - which also meant more individual points. Points that he would earn in quick fashion.   
  
"Yanno," he began, bringing the Fox towards the three Aralinas from the right. "It almost insults me that they think so highly of you that they`d ignore me," he finished a few seconds later, just as the Fox caught the first Helcat completely off guard, plowing through the Zoid`s right hiblit gun and causing the motor to explode. In a chain reaction, the rest of the weapon`s ammunition followed, and the resulting fireball rocked both of the other Aralinas to the side as well.   
  
That didn`t stop the Shadow Fox though, the Zoid literally dove through the flames and smashed into the Dark Horn, landing right on top and balancing there long enough to bring his dual impact cannon to bear on the remaining Helcat, blasting the Zoid right in the base of the topside of the neck, severing it`s 'spine,' so to speak by destroying close to a dozen vital connections to other systems, which included the command and combat systems both.   
  
The Dark Horn went last, and it went with the least messy end. A single strike from the Shadow Fox`s left foreclaw - not using the Strike Laser Claw attack, just the basic claw itself - to stab and cut right through the other Zoid`s thick hide and break it`s back.   
  
A few seconds later, the screeching, howling, _proud_ Shadow Fox hopped down off of it`s latest victory, literally prancing around the three trashed Zoids as the Blade Liger snorted annoyedly.   
  
"Friggin` ham," Mark uttered to himself. Then the ejector seat option popped up onscreen...   
  
"**_I TAKE IT BACK! YOU`RE GREAT! REALLY!!!_**"   
  
If the Shadow Fox had movable lips, it would have been grinning like an idiot just about now.   
  
  
"Nice to see he finally got the gall to take an entire team without Kyle watchin` his back," Harabec thought aloud, leering over at the annoyed expression on Abbie`s face and then shrugging to himself without another word. He reasoned it was either a mixture of concern and possibly something in the past involving a Zoid, or only just one of the two likelihoods. Either way, it wasn`t his business and he wasn`t intent on prying, so instead of that, he shifted his attention back to the television.   
  
"They got quicker," he noted, watching as the team of salvage Gustavs, all of them an unconventional model designed specifically for all terrain, even underseas, shuffled up and hauled off the remains of the eviscerated Aralina Team.   
  
That meant there was just one left, and that meant that the Suicide Team were about to deal with the Class B Champions.   
  
"Business`s about to pick up," he mused, stealing a seat from the other side of the counter and putting it to use.   
  
  
"Gotta hand `em one thing," Mark exclaimed, watching as the great golden Whale King, dubbed the Lord Saber according to a few of the spec sheets that were made public on it, descending down from the skies at a slow, deliberate pace. It looked more like an enormous shark though, powerful and imposing, bristling with close to a half dozen visible gunports and with an engine roar that was sheerly deafening even from close to a mile away.   
  
"And that would be?" Kyle asked dimly, also keeping tabs on the huge carrier as it came down. "They`ve definately got style," Mark answered.   
  
Seconds passed and then the enormous carrier, measuring in at close to a kilometer in length alone, opened it`s mouth with a loud cry, just as three yellow Saber Tigers dropped down from within and landed precisely next to each other in a delta formation. The Kings of Class B had arrived.   
  
The Tigers were here.   
  
"Omari, Lineback!"   
  
"Yeah!?" Both answered in unison.   
  
"Let`s show these upstarts how it`s done!"   
  
"We`re Tigers, one and all!"   
  
"Tigers to the end!"   
  
"... And our opponents call _us_ the crackheads?" Marcus asked sardonically. "Yeah, really," Kyle agreed with the same tone.   
  
"What are we?!"   
  
"The fierce Tigers Team!"   
  
"_What are we_?!"   
  
"The invincible Tigers Team!"   
  
"**_WHAT ARE WE?!_**"   
  
"**_FUCKING WEIRDOES!_**" Mark interrupted with a joyous, utterly serious shout. Kyle broke into a fit of snickers and all three members of the Sabers Team fell completely silent for almost a half a minute. Finally, Omari spoke up. "Kirkland..."   
  
"... **_START THE MATCH ALREADY!_**" The leader of the team screamed in a rage. Both Omari and Lineback joined in a few seconds later, and after that, the Judge calmly carried out their wishes.   
  
** "Battle mode 0138! The Suicide Team versus the Tigers Team, sub-match five of five! Non-title! Ready?" **  
  
"Hope they don`t spew froth on their controls... Be kinda disappointing if they offed themselves before the match," Marcus commented dimly. "Yep."   
  
** "_FIGHT!!!_" **  
  
In a matter of seconds, the battlefield turned into an outright warzone as the entire Tigers Team went after the Shadow Fox with a vengeance, almost aiming for the cockpit at several points. Mark and the Fox were better than to take the damage without a fight though, dodging out of the way by inches and charging the enemy team with a mildly insane cackle, while Kyle and the Ivory Blade Liger just stood there, waiting to be noticed.   
  
And then the Shadow Fox finally took a hit as no less than nine shots blew apart the ground in front of it, sending a combination of a fireball, melting shrapnel and debris right up into the Zoid`s underbelly, flinging it back a ways before Mark finally spoke up, a bit annoyed given the fact that he was presently hanging upside down in the cockpit since the Shadow Fox had landed on it`s back.   
  
"Hey Kyle."   
  
"Yeah?"   
  
"Think you could get off your lazy ass and help a bit?"   
  
"But I enjoy watching you get your ass kicked!" Kyle complained amusedly, jumping into action even as he did so. Several seconds passed by while Mark continued dodging around after the Shadow Fox got to it`s feet, and then one of the Tigers, namely the one Kirkland was piloting, screeched out a cry of something along the lines of pain, flinging forward of the other two and backflipping as the Ivory Blade Liger, shield in place, charged into battle from behind, ramming the other Zoid and then flipping both blades down, trying to slice Omari and Lineback`s Saber Tigers in half.   
  
The attack missed on both ends, and instead of being sliced in half, both Tigers swung to a halt on their forepaws, allowing the Blade Liger to dash ahead of them, just as the Shadow Fox doubled back, leaping over Kyle and the Liger only to land and dive forward, tackling Lineback`s Saber Tiger right off of it`s feet and right into that of Kirkland, which was already damaged from before to the extent that it`s back legs were almost useless.   
  
That left Omari.   
  
With a hard skid and a rapid turn, the Blade Liger set itself to face the remaining Tiger, just as a number of rounds smashed into it`s shield. "Invincible, huh?" Kyle asked with a smirk. Omari winced and the Liger dropped it`s shield, blades zinging forward forward. A second later, Omari`s Saber Tiger had it`s lower jaw blown off, while it`s shoulders met a similar fate against the firepower of the Ivory Blade Liger`s blasters.   
  
This happened at about the same time that Lineback and Mark`s battle with one another hit it`s fever pitch, with both Zoids breaking into little more than a rolling brawl before the Shadow Fox snapped it`s teeth tightly around the Tiger`s throat, rattling it viciously in a manner more befitting of a wolf than any fox.   
  
Lineback didn`t quit though, opening fire right into the Shadow Fox`s right shoulder as best he could before an errant left claw swiped his undergun right off, raking a trail across the Zoid`s armor until finally, the Shadow Fox closed it`s mouth completely, effectively severing the equivelent of the Saber Tiger`s jugular.   
  
Given that Kirkland`s Zoid was virtually immobilized from the second hand abuse it had taken, the match was over.   
  
** "Battle over! Battle over! The winner is... The Suicide Team!"   
  
** "Hold it!" A new voice interjected annoyedly. It was a man, obviously, a bit scratchy, a bit high pitched and a good bit nerdy, but still a man. "Eh?" Mark voiced in near-contempt at the sound of anyone even _thinking_ of disputing a victory as absolute - and tiring - as that one had been. "Who the hell are you?" Kyle asked dimly, obviously at least as annoyed as Mark was contemptuous.   
  
"Norris Packard, leader of the Packard Team. I`m here to challenge you bastards to a re-match."   
  
"... For god`s sake, you lazy sonsabitches didn`t even show up yesterday!" Mark complained. "What he said," Kyle muttered.   
  
"... Do you accept?" Norris asked angrily, his Zoid still out of sight. "... We`ll accept when you admit your momma plays your cousin-brother`s skin flute five times weekly, with an encore of the sister-daughter`s cornhole getting stuffed with your uncle-dad`s special pie," Mark growled out.   
  
"Uh... Mark..."   
  
"_What_?"   
  
"That made no sense. At all."   
  
"... Sure it did. You just don`t know it yet."   
  
"... Right. Anyway..."   
  
"Tomorrow, before you enter Battle mode 0138, re-match against the Packard Team. Is it a deal?" Norris asked again. "If it`ll shut you up, yeah," both members of the Suicide Team groaned in unison. "See you on the battlefield then," Norris stated, just as a black Heldigunner unearthed itself from several dozen yards in front of the Shadow Fox and the Ivory Blade Liger, taking a moment before scurrying away at full speed.   
  
"What the hell was his problem?" Kyle grumbled.   
  
"Bet he has anal warts. Like you`re big gay uncle, Phill."   
  
"... That was cheap, man."   
  
"Cheapshots are the best shots. `Nuff said."   
  
"... Newbie."   
  
"Chinny."   
  
"_Markie_."   
  
"**_HEY!_**"   
  


_ End Chapter Twenty-Two_  


  


* * *

  
  
**Author`s Note:** The madness continues :P And if anyone noticed, **yes**, Norris Packard was intended to be something of a tribute(in name only, if nothing else) to teh l33t0r Zeon Gouf pilot from 08th MS Team.  
  
**EndlessAdventure:** Friend of mine coined the term "Four Days of Suicide" for Mark and Kyle`s trip through the hells of leaping before looking :P  
  
**ZeonReborn:** ... *Simply sprays the cookie making factory with napalm, then utilizes Sh33p minions to destroy all of the remaining cookies, cookie dough, etc. that Zeon could get his hands on.* Napalm > Cookies >_>;  
  
**Zinou:** More bickering, bitching, whining, verbal jousting and witty insults than you`ll be able to shake a stick at... And yes, Mark single handedly kicks the rating up to 'R' with how much he cusses when he`s half asleep, hasn`t eaten more than a single meal a day for three days straight and needs to bathe **very** badly >_> And yes, Jamie has quite a problem... Too bad I`m not going to be able to resolve it for a little while longer. Ah well...  
  
That`s all for now folks, read and review, enjoy and Sh33p out. See ya next time!  
  



	24. Lets Push Things Forward

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I do not own Zoids.  
  


* * *

  
  


**New Age **  
_Lets Push Things Forward   
  
_

"You say that every thing sounds the same   
Then you go buy them! There's no excuses my friend   
Let's push things forward!"   
  
  
"I feel like hammered shit," Mark groaned dryly, wiping his eyes with one hand and then letting out a fairly loud seeming yawn. "Look it, too," Kyle replied with an equally dry tone, though his voice lacked most of the exhaustion that had plagued his team mate. "... No, that would be you. Chinfucker," Mark growled back annoyedly. "Yanno... I must`ve been on something _real_ good to agree to twenty battles in four days..."   
  
"You were probably in horrified awe of the fact that I can decapitate you with my sharpened chin," Kyle shot back, letting out a yawn of his own a few seconds later. "... You didn`t sleep last night either, huh?" Mark asked. "Nope," the other replied. "... We`re both fethin` nuts..."   
  
"That`s why we`ve got such a catchy team name!"   
  
"... You`ve lost it. You`ve freakin` lost it."   
  
"Like I had it to begin with?" Kyle asked. "Good point," Mark replied. "When`re the sock puppet brigade due to show up?" He asked, obviously referencing the Packard Team. One could easily tell that Marcus Harlock had a palpable dislike of the group, or at least the leader. "Not too long," Kyle answered dimly.   
  
A sonic boom, followed by the sound of four tracks of dirt shuffling up and falling away several seconds later proved that Kyle was more correct in his guess than he had wanted.   
  
Four Zoids. One was a Heldigunner, one a Saber Tiger, another was Guysack and the last was a Command Wolf that had been decked out with three gattling guns, two on it`s sides, one on it`s back. It also had two machine guns on it`s face, rendering the Zoid a fairly dangerous weapon on it`s own. Complimented by three others, things looked a bit grim for the Suicide Team   
  
"... Just _had_ to open your big fat mouth, didn`t you?" Mark asked.   
  
** "The area within a five mile radius is a designated Zoid Battlefield. This zone is now restricted. Only competitors and personnel have authorized entry. All others must leave the area at once. Area scanned. Battlefield set up. The Suicide Team versus the Packard Team. Battle Mode 0982." **  
  
"Payback time," Norris` voice carried over the broadband.   
  
** "Ready..."   
  
** "... Should I?" Mark asked.   
  
"Please," Kyle answered.   
  
"Hey Norris!"   
  
** "_FIGHT!_"   
  
** A delay. The action didn`t start just yet as the surrounded Shadow Fox and the Ivory Blade Liger held their ground.   
  
"What?" Norris answered finally. "Your mom has anal warts the size o` my dad`s pet dog!" Mark shot off, promptly swinging the Shadow Fox forward and smacking the Heldigunner across the cheek, only to have his Zoid reflexively jump up to avoid the Heldigunner`s bladed tail. "**_SHE DOES NOT!!!_**" Norris screamed irately. "Cheap shots by the truckload, huh?" Kyle asked, shrewdly dodging between the Heldigunner and the Saber Tiger with the opening that Mark had caused to form there.   
  
"Cheap is the only way to go when dealing with people who have _**ANAL WARTS!**_" Marcus replied cheerfully, twisting the Fox around and swiping the attacking Guysack before it could do any damage. The Fox growled annoyedly and then proceeded to shoot the smaller Zoid right out of the air with it`s main gun. "What`s with you?" Mark asked dryly, darting away from the Heldigunner. The Shadow Fox growled again, then swerved around, smacking the Command Wolf on the side of the face with a hip and leaving it wide open for Kyle and the Liger to execute a shield ram.   
  
"... Oh, come on man, just because I`m not letting you missile someone yet doesn`t mean you won`t!" Mark retorted. Fox growled again. "Yeah, so?" He asked. Another growl. "... You`re right, perhaps it`s a more serious problem..."   
  
A pause from one half of the Suicide Team while Kyle and the Liger basically dismantled the Command Wolf, slicing it in half at the waist after the shield ram and then tearing the left foreleg loose in mid-air before spitting it at the Saber Tiger. "Hey Norris!" Mark shouted.   
  
"**_THERE ARE NO ANAL WARTS HERE, DAMNIT!_**"   
  
"No, no..."   
  
"... Oh. What then?"   
  
"Did any kindly old men ever 'touch you' when you were younger?"   
  
"... _**HEY DAMNIT!**_" Norris screamed. "Ding, ding, ding," Mark voiced in reply, promptly dodging out of the way of the smaller Zoid once again. "Good call, Fox," he congratulated, causing the Zoid to rumble a bit in response.   
  
"Your Zoid hassome serious issues, yanno that?" Kyle asked. "I blame white Ligers," Mark answered dully, again jumping straight up and dodging the irate Norris Packard`s Heldigunner before amputating the Zoid`s arms and legs in a quick double swipe of the Strike Laser Claws, activated seconds before the actual strike by the Shadow Fox itself. "Cute," Kyle muttered. "Real friggin` cute."   
  
One hideously oversized explosion later, the remains of a Saber Tiger rained down near the Shadow Fox. Most had been burnt, a few were cut cleanly but overall, it bore the damage of having been struck in too many ways with too much speed and brutality to reveal any singular way as to how the Saber Tiger had begun or finished being torn apart.   
  
** "Battle over! Battle over! The winner is... The Suicide Team!"   
  
** "Gee, sounds like someone`s grumpy over having to do work that doesn`t involve their pelvic muscles, huh?" Mark asked. "... I`m not _that_ much of a bishounen, am I?"   
  
"Worse."   
  
"... Eh?"   
  
"If you had boobs and I was single, I`d`ve probably hit on you -"   
  
"That bad?!"   
  
"- with a tire iron, but still."   
  
"... Oh fuck you."   
  
  
Unlike the past two days, Leon had basically been kicked out of the apartment circa last night since he`d been close to living there for three days. It hadn`t been a harsh kicking out of course, more along the lines of a joking Naomi playfully shoving him outside under complaints that he basically lived there more than he did his own home. This wasn`t exactly untrue, of course, but Leon had to agree that there was a certain point where two people needed to be alone, so he`d left without question, even though Brad was probably staying there even more than he was.   
  
Hands tucked in his jeanpockets, Leon Tauros was slow and even a little on the lazy side as he made his way down the street over towards one of his favorite places to eat, especially early in the morning. It was unusually chilly in Farentown this morning, not painfully so or anything, but Leon was glad he had on his jacket.   
  
"Today is looking to be another big day for the Suicide Team. Already having made up for a no-show with the first day`s events by outright demolishing the well respected Packard Team, Kyle Mazemia and Marcus Harlock are looking to cement the likelihood of their team making it all the way to Class A in just four days of excessive battling, meeting with opponents today in the forms of the Breacher, Norsemen, Darson, Talon and Steiner teams, all of whom have stated that they`re gunning for the Suicide Team - and each other..."   
  
_ "Six in one day... Guess the lack of rest is starting to chip away at any common sense they might`ve had,"_ Leon thought, glancing idly down the sidewalk and watching a middle aged businessman almost knock an old lady out of the way just to dart across the street, covering four lanes of busy morning traffic at a four way intersection and almost getting hit as a result.   
  
_ "Guess it`s not so common anymore,"_ the older Tauros sibling thought distastefully.   
  
  
** "The area within a five mile radius is a designated Zoid battlefield. Only participants and authorized personnel are allowed within, all others must leave the area at once! The Suicide Team versus the Breacher Team. Battle mode 0138. Area scanned..." **  
  
"End of the line, Suicide Team!"   
  
** "Battlefield set up."   
  
** "... Says a guy who named his team after the breaching of dogs` asses."   
  
** "Ready?"   
  
** "Will the cheap shots _ever_ end with you?"   
  
** "****_FIGHT!_**"   
  
"**_HELL NO, THEY WON`T!_**" Marcus answered loudly, launching the Shadow Fox forward with the laser vulcan ablaze, spewing out pulse lasers quickly enough to plaster the Breacher Team`s only aerial Zoid out of the sky before it could even pose much of a danger, while Kyle followed suit a few seconds later, charging forward with blades extended out.   
  
Shadow and Ivory both shrieked and roared their battlecries, with the smaller of the two almost seeming to look enthusiastic as it slammed into the falling hulk of what had been a Redler, driving right into line of fire from the Breacher Team`s lone Dark Horn and using the fallen aerial Zoid like something of a shield in the process. The larger on the two was swifter though, terrifyingly so if someone was on the recieving end of things. A matter of seconds passed as the Zoid slipped between the Gordos Zoids that made up the rest of the team, passing like a three striped white-and-gold blur between the two before swinging it`s blades back into neutral and swerving around with a growl.   
  
Both Gordos promptly toppled over, severed neatly in half at the mid-point of the hip. Kyle smirked tiredly. "Guess we`ll be having another easy day, eh?" He asked.   
  
"Easy?! You call this crap easy?!" Mark asked in reply, just as the Shadow Fox jumped all the way around the Dark Horn and jabbed a claw right into the joint between a hind leg and the bigger Zoid`s body, twisting straight and basically breaking the leg right off before putting two explosive rounds into the opening that resulted there, then allowing the effect of a chain reaction do the rest, blowing holes out of the larger Zoid`s thick hide until it finally toppled over and didn`t move again.   
  
"... Well, now that you mention it, I guess it is," he mumbled finally. "Concession accepted. Newbie."   
  
** "Battle over! Battle over! The winner is... The Suicide Team!" **  
  
"**_SHUT UP, DAMNIT!_**"   
  
  
_ "Interesting,"_ Leon thought with an ominous tone. He had lingered near the public broadcast screen - every city had them, and usually it played Zoid battles or government announcements - rather than continuing on to breakfast, if only so that he could watch the match. _"Their opponents haven`t been getting weaker at all, most have been pretty powerful and still, it`s like they`re running circles around them. Could their Zoids be doing the work or have they improved so much in such a short time that it`s almost like child`s play for them?"_ He wondered to himself, grayish eyes narrowing for a bit before easing to their usual state.   
  
_ "Suppose they actually might make it through this. Would be interesting to wipe that smirk off of Mazemia`s face though,"_ he mused, deciding that breakfast was more important than watching a pair of lunatics try the impossible and/or stupid and actually get away with it.   
  
  
"So..." One began. "So..." The other continued. "You wanted to settle this?" The first of the two asked dryly, a look of grizzled resolve on his face. The second, and older of the two merely gave a nod before continuing. "Yes. This has gone on long enough, it`s time to end our little game. _Once and for all_."   
  
The first gave a small sigh before reaching up and scratching the side of his head. The second remained silent and dangerous, but both never took their eyes to anything else. Not once during their heated staredown, did they move. Their surroundings were unfamiliar and familiar to both at the same time. A desert, surrounded by smashed and burnt ruins, ruins that had once been a small, temporary town owned and governed by the International Association of Zoid Academics, an organization founded originally by Thomas Schubaltz a few years prior to his death and later maintained for almost half a century by Fiona Alysse Linette-Fleiheit. It was an organization currently maintaining the membership of every single major, and almost all minor colleges across Zi, including places like the D Institute for Higher Learning, among others.   
  
"How?" The first asked.   
  
"A Zoid battle. Your Shield Liger versus my Saber Tiger, best equipment we can find on both," the second answered. "Winner take all?"   
  
"No. No money, no Zoid ownership. No. Way. Out."   
  
"0927?"   
  
"Exactly."   
  
A pause. The first seemed to settle into deliberation, markedly lowering down to sit upon a chunk of rubble, the result of a battle that had raged here not too long ago. The catch to having a Zoid battle was that it meant that both of the two potential combatants would be 'saddling up' for the first time in close to ten and a half years. Neither had fought in an official match during that time, neither had really trained and both were very likely to have to re-new their registrations just to carry their single battle out.   
  
The second waited patiently though, arms crossed over his chest, not a word coming out to disrupt the other`s thoughts, only an expression laying somewhere between contempt and competition.   
  
The first stood back up.   
  
"It`s on."   
  
"The Kairan Valley, three days from now. That should be long enough to get our Zoids back out and soup them up," the second stated. "Agreed," the first replied, turning away. "And one more thing," the second began. "After this, win, lose or draw, we have to talk."   
  
"Will do," the first said. Minutes passed by, and two jeeps split apart from each other, leaving the ruins behind, almost undisturbed from what it was like before their newly concluded meeting.   
  
  
** "The Suicide Team versus the Norsemen Team! Battle mode 0138. Ready?" **  
  
"... Hi-ho, hi-ho," Mark began before Kyle joined in. "It`s off to Hell you go," both of them sang rather cheerfully like the absolute lunatics they had become from days of little food, even less sleep, hard physical labor and fairly rapid Zoid battles. Their only real saving grace was that they`d become so flamingly reckless that their opponents were literally caught off guard by how stupid and suicidal their moves had been at times, or their random bursts of skill.   
  
Two against two now, though. A Rev Raptor and a lightly modified Gunsniper. Relatively even compared to the majority of previous matches, but it still promised to be something of a squash given the mismatch in size, firepower and armor that the two teams had with each other. Gunsnipers and Rev Raptors weren`t the toughest Zoids after all, nor were they the most powerful.   
  
Of course, the Norsemen weren`t exactly known for having common sense, either.   
  
Neither side opened fire for several seconds, and then the Rev Raptor and the Gunsniper both lunged forward, actions replicated by the Suicide Team. The Liger and the Raptor met halfway, but the lighter Zoid showcased it`s agility in grand fashion, jumping over the Blade Liger and trying to swipe across it`s hind legs with both bladed feet. It didn`t work, but it was a good try.   
  
The Sniper and the Fox on the other hand, had a less spectacular meeting as the smaller Zoid came to a dead stop, hopped to the side and then kicked in it`s back mounted thrusters, darting right by the charging Shadow Fox and landing with it`s tail already flipped into sniper-mode. An instant later, the round came flying, single and dangerous, punching a trench into the topside of the Fox, narrowly missing the ear and before that, only barely avoiding the turreting mechanisms for the Zoid`s main gun.   
  
"Guess we actually have a challenge now, huh?" Mark asked dryly. "Challenge? What challenge?" Kyle asked, charging the Rev Raptor again and meeting with the same jump tactic, only to flip the blasters straight up and smash in the Raptor`s gut with two quick shots, continuing along afterward as the other Zoid tumbled to the ground in a heap, slow to get up.   
  
"Arrogant bastard," Marcus muttered annoyedly. "It isn`t bragging if you can back it up," Kyle shot back. "Your mom," Mark grumbled, just as the Fox willfully dodged under another sniper round, twisting about and opening fire. The Gunsniper sprang out of place without even unlocking it`s rifle, landing with it`s back still turned before taking another shot, then a second right after it.   
  
The Shadow Fox narrowly dodged both, but the Blade Liger didn`t, taking a full impact duo of hits right into it`s side and staggering from them, only to outright fall over an instant later with a loud roar. "_Shit_," Mark growled. "Like ducks in a row," the Gunsniper pilot stated.   
  
"Did he knock your Zoid out?" Mark asked. "Only the combat system," Kyle replied drearily. "Which means you`re out of the fight," Mark groaned. "Unless you win," Kyle reminded. "Right," the less experienced of the two muttered to himself, dodging yet another round by inches as the Gunsniper continued it`s attack. It was almost like a ranged dance as the larger Zoid closed in on the smaller, scurrying out of the way of incoming shots and taking shots of it`s own at the other Zoid at every chance, but eventually -   
  
"_Strike Laser Claw_!"   
  
- it ended. The Gunsniper shrieked and howled, toppling over forward as both left limbs were severed in a single, precision-based attack, gouging out three parralel trenches in the process. The Shadow Fox landed several yards ahead of the Gunsniper, twisting around and allowing the smaller Zoid to land with a trio of dull thuds, it`s arm smacking into the ground just before it`s severed leg finally keeled over with an equally loud thud, though unlike the body of the Zoid, it didn`t skid several inches along from the force of the attack.   
  
"Get to work on rebooting that damn thing," Mark ordered before the Judge could even give the ruling.   
  
** "Battle over! Battle over! The winner is... The Suicide Team!" **  
  
  
_ "Looks like I missed some of the action,"_ Leon thought, vaguely amused at how the Ivory Blade Liger seemed to be doing the equivelent of complaining after the match. _"Must`ve taken a few hard shots to the side,"_ he noted observantly, settling down into his usual seat and glancing up at the waitress. The resturaunt wasn`t one he frequented that often - Leon Tauros was a man who basically lived most of his time camped out either next to a Gustav during he and Naomi`s battle trips(neither of them were ever really home more than a week at a time) or under the Red Blade Liger in a waterproof sleeping bag, and sometimes inside the Zoid`s cockpit.   
  
Never once had he gotten the actual name of the place, apparently it was something like 'Rev`s Diner,' but he knew at least three of the people who worked there on a first name basis. Among these three was the green haired young woman who had paused politely next to his table, though one look at the expression on her face could easily show the mixture of annoyance, worry and outright anger, mixed further with a bit of patience, though it seemed to be wearing thin.   
  
"Worried?" Leon asked. Abbie hesitated briefly before letting out a snort. "Don`t worry, he`ll be fine."   
  
"Fine? He`s wearing himself to death out there," Abbie growled. "He`ll be alright, trust me. It`s his partner who`s probably in more danger," Leon replied. "How so?" Abbie asked dimly. "Because unlike your boyfriend, Mazemia`s taken at least one big hit, Mark is pretty much a-okay aside from a bit of armor damage," Leon pointed out. "That just means he`ll be forced to fight mostly alone..."   
  
"Not much of an optimist, are you?" The older Tauros sibling sighed drearily, wiping what remained of sleep out of one of his eyes with a yawn. "Haven`t been for over a month," she sighed right back, taking out a small notepad. "What`ll it be?" She asked. "The usual," he answered. "So... Large mug of coffee, hot enough to melt most people`s taste buds off?" She asked, going by memory while jotting the order down. "Yeah."   
  
"And a fried chicken sandwhich, ketchup and mayo only, side of bacon and steak fries, right?"   
  
"You know my eating habits too well," Leon stated with a dry smirk. "Comes with the job," Abbie replied with another sigh, darting off to another table a few seconds later. _"Cute couple,"_ Leon mused, not giving it another thought and instead, turning back to the nearby television as the next match began.   
  
  
** "The Suicide Team versus the Darson Team! Battle mode 0138. Ready?" **  
  
"Finished yet?" Mark asked with a bit of a nervous sweat running down the side of his face. Sure, he had improved over the past days, but three against one?   
  
"... Nope."   
  
"... Oh fuck _you_ in the goat ass."   
  
"Fuck me? Why me?! Why not you?!"   
  
"Because I`d bet fifty bucks that you`re used to it."   
  
"_**HEY!**_"   
  
** "_FIGHT!_" **  
  
"This sucks," Mark groaned. "Bitch, bitch, bitch, whine, whine whine..."   
  
The Shadow Fox growled approvingly and dashed forward, ignoring the controls of the pilot to do otherwise and instead dodging through a hail of explosions with a nearly insane glee echoing through in each synthesised-sounding shriek it made, jumping the remaining way and tackling the first of the three Darson Zoids right off of it`s feet, slamming the Helcat into the ground and quite viciously biting a chunk out of it`s chest, jumping back off before corkscrewing out of the way of a number of rockets and landing a dozen or so yards from the downed Zoid.   
  
Mark finally took control, almost reflexively triggering the launch of the EMP net missile. A few seconds passed and the second Darson Zoid, a Command Wolf, toppled over, out of commission and covered in netting. The Fox took control back though, practically yanking it out of Mark`s hands and then dodging through the air again, avoiding the second rocket barrage from the Darson Team`s Gunbluster, a heavy ordnance Zoid, low on agility, relatively quick and heavily armed and armored alike. This one just happened to be packing enough rockets to turn the battlefield into a fireball visible from low orbit.   
  
_ "You lousy bastard, let me take a whack at it!"_ Mark demanded in his thoughts. Fox only growled passively and landed with a skid, it`s path through the air causing the Gunbluster to unwittingly blast the still-downed Helcat out of the battle due to the pilot`s recklessness. From there, it was all over.   
  
"_Strike Laser Claw_!"   
  
The Gunbluster landed on it`s belly with a flop and a wave of dust and dirt, sparking off electricity after it`s entire arsenal of rockets was literally torn off, flying through the air for several dozen yards before exploding into a great ball of fire with rolled through the air almost a hundred more feet until it hit the ground and exploded again, the blast being visible from half-a-battlefield away but thankfully not big enough to consume the Fox and the Darson Team.   
  
"Glory hog," Mark grumbled while the Shadow Fox had a field day, shrieking out it`s now _obvious_(to the Fox anyway) superiority over the Ivory Blade Liger, which only roared back in an annoyed sort of way.   
  
  
"_Halt_," a voice echoed sternly into the cockpit. _"This is far enough anyway,"_ he thought to himself, bringing the Storm Fury to a total stop at the trench lined around the Guardian Force Maximum Security Women`s Prison, causing the Zoid to rumble uneasily at all of the guns that were being aimed at it in a matter of seconds. Instead of attacking though, Vega simply brought the huge orange Zoid to turn around, coaxing it into staying calm via his own emotions, then flipping onto the usual Guardian Force frequency to save them all some effort. Sure, it would probably get a normal offender a fine of close to 15,000 credits, but given that Vega was underaged to be tried and fined as an adult, he knew that he could get away with it.   
  
"Don`t bother shooting at me, I`m not here to attack."   
  
"Then why are you here in a Zoid packing enough firepower to level the place?"   
  
"Because I have reason to believe that Kale Obscura will be attacking soon. I can`t allow him to succeed, and it was either this or the prison that the Count is being kept in, and I value my mother more than I value a balding asshole I never met," Vega answered dryly. "Kale Obscura is heading this way?"   
  
"He might be headed this way, but he might be headed for the Count, and he might switch patterns again."   
  
The guard on the other end of the conversation made a fairly uneasy sound and then flipped the comm off, leaving Vega alone with his thoughts. And one other.   
  
** Do you think they will come? **  
  
_ "50/50 probably." _  
  
** ... In other words, you have no idea. **  
  
_ "Kale **is** prone to changing tactics when it`s least convenient."   
  
****_ Bastard.   
  
_ "My sentiments exactly." _  
  
  
** "The Suicide Team versus the Talon Team! Battle mode 0138. Ready?" **  
  
"We`re back online!" Kyle exclaimed proudly. "And still busted up like a crack whore," Mark stated dryly. "... Gee, such enthusiasm," the more experienced member of the team muttered, obviously more than a little annoyed by his team mate`s sarcastic nature. "Damn right I`m enthusiastic," the former trucker finally replied. "I get to have the fun of whacking these sonsabitches at point blank while you have to pansy around and snipe them," he exclaimed.   
  
** "_FIGHT!_"   
  
** "Just shut up," Kyle groaned as the Ivory Blade Liger promptly turned tail and started to limp away in a near run, leaving the Shadow Fox to draw fire from the three Talon Team Zoids, two of which were Red Horns armed with dual hyper cannons and triple machine guns on either side, the third of which was a quicker, more agile Command Wolf, crafted specifically to cover the two larger, more powerful Zoids as a point guard.   
  
Mark and the Fox were immediately put on the defensive, unable to attack without fear of being outright crushed under the sheer volume of firepower that the two Red Horns were spraying out like water hoses, firing in a chained sequence that allowed one to cover during the cooldown time of the other`s weaponry, with machine guns blazing off whenever the Fox made a pause to try and change course in between strides, with the Command Wolf only sparingly taking pot shots.   
  
"A little _help_ would be nice!" Mark complained, halting the Fox and then blasting forward with the rear thrusters at full power, sending the Zoid almost out of control if not for it correcting his mistake on it`s own, narrowly dodging a pair of hyper cannon shots, both of which detonated into fairly pronounced, white hot fireballs in front of the smaller Zoid. Fox growled, Mark grit his teeth and then both swung around to face the Talon Team, charging forward in an instant.   
  
It was a fairly _bad_ move, the only saving grace being that the two Red Horn pilots were caught off guard by how unbelievably stupid it was, delaying their reactions just long enough for the Fox to get within melee attack range. Mark wasn`t going to take the time to try and aim for them, Fox was too busy just trying to keep them from getting fried but while the strategy was sound - if one lacked common sense - they hadn`t accounted for the Command Wolf, which shot up from behind the two Red Horns and tackled the nimbler, slightly larger Shadow Fox in mid-air, twisting violently before slamming it down onto it`s side.   
  
"**_SHIT!_**" Mark screamed, though, Fox was too busy putting up a fight of it`s own, rolling over again and dodging machine gun fire by default, slamming the Wolf down this time and then locking jaws with it. Again, the two agile Zoids rolled over, and again the Red Horn pilots missed, but this time the Fox jumped off of it`s foe, lunging forward at one of the Red Horns only to take a number of light impacts from the Wolf`s back mounted pulse guns, delaying the attack just long enough for the second Red Horn to close in and slam into the Shadow Fox`s side, throwing the small Zoid into a tumbling roll along the ground.   
  
"Whenever you`re ready, assfuck!" Mark yelled angrily, swinging the disoriented Fox back up to it`s feet only to be rocked right back onto it`s side by the missed hyper cannon shots.   
  
"Always bitching," Kyle groaned, swinging both of his blades straight up. In unison, a pair of interchangeable barrel container units, cylindrical in shape, sprang up out of their concealment places, unlocking the blaster barrels and whirling around to put the sniper-type barrels onto the backs of the blades before dropping down into the body. Both blades then swing straight forward, while the forelegs of the Liger spread out and bent slightly, allowing the two weapons to have a better line of fire by lowering the forward half of the Zoid`s body down.   
  
Two lenses extended out in front of Kyle`s face, one to either side. Both joysticks handled the movement of the barrels, and with the patience of a fisherman, he bid his time. Mark was in dire straights but Kyle was still waiting until finally -   
  
"Pop."   
  
- he pulled both triggers. In unison, two thick, powerful bolts of plasma shot out of the sniper barrels, screaming through the air with precision and speed along. The first bolt slipped through the Command Wolf`s path and missed it`s nose by inches, continuing on to punch a perfectly circular hole through the upper face of the Red Horn, so precise that it blew off the front of the cockpit and left the pilot completely unharmed, though it came dangerously close to breaking the rules. The second shot was equally precise, zinging behind the first and tagging the second Red Horn right through the hole that the first shot had caused, slipping under the frill-like armor extensions and striking the bottom of the Zoid`s throat, cutting over a dozen vital functions and then continuing on to blow out a small crater in the ground.   
  
Both Red Horns paused and then fell over at once. It had been a perfectly executed snipejob, leaving only the Command Wolf as the last standing member of the Talon Team.   
  
"That better, Newbie?"   
  
"... I hate you," Mark answered dully with a sigh, bringing the superficially damaged Shadow Fox back up to it`s feet once again, then shifting it`s head to face the lone Command Wolf. With a ragged sigh befitting a man who`d had little sleep, little food, was utterly exhausted and more than a little angry, Marcus Harlock brought the Shadow Fox into an all out assault, catching the Command Wolf off guard and jamming it`s claws into the wrist joints of the other Zoid`s forelegs, then promptly - harshly - biting the smaller Zoid`s throat before breaking into a crocodile-like death roll, tearing open the wrist joints and outright severing the Command Wolf`s head in a fairly brutal way before dropping it, and the pilot, onto the ground.   
  
"Aww, Newbie ish pisshed!"   
  
"... Shut up, Chinmo."   
  
** "Battle over! Battle over! The winner is... The Suicide Team!"   
  
**  
"See what I mean?" Abbie asked in a disgruntled tone, setting Leon`s food down on the table he was seated at. The man could only give a mute nod of agreement before speaking up with a dry tone of voice. "I guess so. Does seem pretty reckless, but his partner definately should have been quicker on the draw if he was going to sit there and snipe," he pointed out, taking a sip of his coffee without another word. It had taken the Suicide Team roughly thirty minutes to punch through four of the five opponents they were up against today, the same time as it had taken his food to cook, him to eat and then order seconds on everything(just because he happened to have the only legitimate claim to sanity in the Tauros family didn`t mean that Leon ate any less than his sister or father did), good timing on their part but he was easily able to pick out mistakes in every attack they`d made.   
  
"I`ll go easy on them if they make it to Class A - and I think they will," he promised dully, noticing the glare that Abbie had set on him as he was about to continue eating. "At least, I`ll go easy on Mark. His partner, I`m not to sure about, and I can`t really make any promises about Naomi - she`s got a grudge with your boyfriend since her own lost the Shadow Fox to him," he corrected himself. Abbie rose up a brow. "Eh? I thought she was single..."   
  
"Officially she is, but at the rate she and Brad are going, I give that two weeks. Tops."   
  
"And you?"   
  
"I could care less about getting a significant other. I have other priorities," Leon replied darkly, a tone of dedication that hadn`t been seen on Zi in decades showing in his voice before he promptly went about eating his food. Abbie only nodded lightly and glanced back at the screen as her boyfriend`s last match of the day began.   
  
  
** "The Suicide Team versus the Steiner Team! Battle mode 0138, sub-match five of five! Ready?!" **  
  
"Time to live up to our team name..."   
  
"Yep."   
  
** "_FIGHT!!!_"   
  
** With a shriek, the Shadow Fox lunged forward, ignoring the damage to itself and charging recklessly into battle against the far larger, far more powerful Gojulas. It was a standard model, white-and-gray, packing two heavy twin repeater cannons on it`s sides, twin Republic Supercannons mounted to fire from just above and behind the shoulders, several machine guns of varying size along it`s tail and back and a quad cannon pod on either wrist. After this, there was a quicker, more agile Spinosapper, outfitted with two lasersaws, a machine gun on either side of it`s head and a double impact cannon on it`s stomach. The team was topped off by an oddly modified Rev Raptor with a Wild Weasel unit.   
  
The Ivory Blade Liger on the other hand, hung back, throwing up it`s shield and getting down into sniper mode, even as supercannon shots slammed into it`s defenses, pushing the Zoid back and proving to Kyle that his gamble was a risky one.   
  
With speed and guile, the Fox dove headlong into the action, literally plowing through the full firepower of the Rev Raptor and plastering the enemy Zoid right off of it`s feet with a salvo of pulse lasers intense enough to blow one of the other Zoid`s legs off, sweeping around and opening up with both ranged weapons on the Spinosapper, which ducked out of the way and shot back, lunging forward and delivering close to a dozen quick slashes at the nimble Fox, missing every single one of them in the process.   
  
"I can`t get off any shots with this bastard pummeling me the way he is!" Kyle yelled over the roar of slow happening explosions, each of which shoved the Blade Liger back a little further every time the supercannons made impact, with the shields only barely holding and regenerating fast enough to take the next hits. "I`ll be with you in a minute," Mark finally answered, biting into his cheek and allowing the Shadow Fox to take a fairly cracked sort of action: Headbutting upward. It wasn`t something that seemed that crazy at first, but considering that the cockpit was both in the top of the head and protected only by what amounted to armored optics and some plexiglass, it wasn`t that smart a move.   
  
Either way, it worked. The Spinosapper stumbled back just enough steps for Mark to pull the trigger and nail it squarely in the stomach - right down it`s own double impact cannon barrels - with two highly explosive rounds from the Fox`s chest mounted double impact cannon. In a flash, the Zoid did the rest, zig zagging around the Spinosapper as the chain reaction blew the entire middle-front portion of it`s body open.   
  
The Spinosapper fell onto it`s stomach, and the Shadow Fox continued on, opening fire on the Gojulas with it`s laser vulcan gun in a blistering hail that would`ve easily annihilated most Zoids. To the Gojulas though, as with the Berserk Fury, it only caused several relatively small explosions and some superficial burnmarks, also shifting the towering Zoid`s balance just so that it`s aim was off, missing the Ivory Blade Liger by a good margin and allowing Kyle to take aim safely, dropping his shield and then taking two shots at once.   
  
The Gojulas stumbled again, both shots slamming fiercely into it`s throat, just beneath the very head, but it didn`t go down as the Red Horns had, instead standing strong and shifting onto one foot as the Shadow Fox charged it again.   
  
Fox jumped, the Gojulas swung it`s free leg up and kicked it with the force of a hundred medieval battering rams. The momentum of some 56 tons of Zoid shifted into reverse in less than a tenth of a second, sending the small black-and-gold Zoid flying back at almost twice the speed of it`s jump, tumbling through the air over the wreckage of both the Rev Raptor and the Spinosapper before landing with a violent roll on the ground, kicking up a trail of dust in the process.   
  
"**_Holy shit_**," Kyle voiced, throwing his shield back up and glancing over at the downed heap of the Shadow Fox, which didn`t even budge or groan. "Mark! You okay?!"   
  
"I think I busted open the side of my head..."   
  
"How`s the Fox?"   
  
"Uh... Gimme a minute," Mark muttered, painfully leaning up straight, though it left him hanging sideways in the cockpit, and propping himself up on one arm. Normally he didn`t feel pain unless he chose to, otherwise he could ignore it for a time, but with blood literally pouring out of the side of his head, just fore and above his ear, pain was pretty much all that was keeping him awake. The Shadow Fox was in equally severe condition, it`s combat and command systems both on the verge of freezing up, virtually every safety system - from the automatic shut-off units for the main power generator to the collision detection system to the safeties in place on internal temperature - was completely offline.   
  
"Well?"   
  
"I can keep fighting but there`s no guarantee that I won`t blow myself up doing it," Mark reported drearily, even as he brought the unconcious Shadow Fox up to it`s feet on uneasy, falty seeming legs. That was another thing that differentiated Zoids from purely biological life: They didn`t have to be concious to move around. As long as a Zoid had a pilot and the pilot survived with command and combat systems intact, that Zoid could keep fighting until it was either disabled or outright destroyed, whichever happened first.   
  
"Fucking joy," Kyle growled annoyedly. "I`ve still got too much damage to even depoly one of my blades for melee attack and I can`t really hit the guy at this rate... He`s just gonna freaking push me off the battlefield!"   
  
Mark again checked his systems. The laser vulcan gun`s turreting capacity was virtually blown out, but that didn`t matter with a target the size of a Gojulas. _"Capacitator system and the rotator`re both blown out too..."_ He thought. That was another bad thing, especially so because it meant the barrels wouldn`t rotate, and if they had stopped in a position where none of the barrels rested in place to channel the lasers out like usual then that meant Mark had a bomb on the back of his Zoid. Even if he could open fire, he still couldn`t do so for very long because then he`d melt the barrel.   
  
All in all, the Suicide Team was in fairly dire straits. Kyle was basically immobilized - he couldn`t move well enough to avoid the Gojulas aim and he had to remain stable on all four legs or he`d fly back even worse than before from the Supercannons, while if he dropped the shield for an attack, he`d just be plastered by the Gojulas` other, quicker firing weapons. Mark was almost a bloody mess by now and he couldn`t perform an attack without playing what essentially amounted to Russian Roulette since the only weapon he had that could effectively damage the Gojulas enough to even budge it was the laser vulcan gun. The double impact cannon was out of commission for whatever reason, he couldn`t get the speed to make a Strike Laser Claw effective and he didn`t have an EMP net missile to use.   
  
It looked as if Mark`s luck - and Kyle`s with it - had just run out. Again, the Liger slid back from getting hit by the Supercannons, and again Mark wheezed. Kyle yelled and the Fox`s eyes dimly regained some of their reddish glow. Seconds passed between shots as the horribly busted up Shadow Fox stumbled around the Rev Raptor and the Spinosapper, their pilots climbing out of the cockpits to try and get away from the action before it was too late.   
  
Another pair of enormous explosions, the Ivory Blade Liger slipped back once again, farther than before this time. Far enough that it almost toppled over backwards. The Shadow Fox growled defiantly and lowered it`s gun with a dazed lack of balance, but it fell to Mark to pull the trigger. Slowly though, that`s exactly what he did. Unsure of his aim, equally unsure of the Fox`s ability to even transmit the signal from the trigger to the gun, he took the shot anyway.   
  
One pulse laser.   
  
One chance.   
  
One success or failure, to be determined solely by luck.   
  
And Mark -   
  
_ "Here goes..."   
  
_ - was a very -   
  
A quick trigger pull...   
  
- lucky human being.   
  
The Gojulas rocked as a single shot slammed into it`s right leg at the knee, punching into - and furthermore imploding - the stabilizer it had made impact with. Luck was definately on Harlock`s side, because the Gojulas had been caught in the middle of the recoil from firing it`s Supercannons, knocking the huge Zoid off balance. One leg couldn`t remain upright properly, thus the Zoid had to make a sudden shift onto it`s tail and it`s left leg, but by then, Kyle had gained the time to drop his shield and swiftly take aim.   
  
One second later, it was over with a flash and a bang. The first shot did little but punch an inches-deep pit into the Gojulas` throat armor, but the second shot had finished the job, plowing through what remained of the thin layers of alloy and gouging into triple redundant electronics and mechanics, knocking the Gojulas` completely offline by slipping between reinforced metal rings that served as the proverbial collums surrounding the huge Zoid`s spinal cord, severing it completely and in one vicious instant.   
  
** "Battle over! Battle over! The winner is..." **  
  
Kyle let out an exhausted laugh and Mark merely flopped his head back with a tired sigh of relief as the Gojulas, deprived of it`s stabilizers and just about everything else, toppled over sideways with a massive thud, smoke leaking out from the lone hole in it`s neck.   
  
** "The Suicide Team!" **  
  
  
"Well done," Leon admitted, visibly impressed at the sight on the television. Nearby, Abbie looked on the verge of going half-insane while Harabec looked to be staring wide eyed at the view of his nephew and Kyle Mazemia`s latest victory. _"But their biggest challenge is going to be tomorrow. They both took a lot of damage today, I doubt they can repair it all in just one day and night, maybe half of another if their luck holds out."_  
  
A pause.   
  
A half-empty cup of lukewarm coffee rose up and -   
  
"A toast to good luck."   
  
- was promptly gulped down before a man in his mid-to-late twenties took out a pair of twenties and laid them on the table, walking out with a swagger to his step more familiar of his father than himself, hands tucked firmly into his jacket pockets.   
  
  
An old storehouse out in the desert. Where was unimportant aside from the fact that it was within a day and a night`s drive of Farentown. It was off the maps, once owned and later abandoned by the Helic Republic military during those especially dark times when they were at war with the Guylos Empire, who overpowered them by roughly eight to one as far as numbers went, and overpowered them further before geniuses like Doctor D and strategists like General Krueger came into play.   
  
Back then, it had been a storage place for parts and ammunition. It had been operated in cohesion with the labratory that Doctor D had first worked in. Today though, it was unowned as far as most people were concerned, but it still stored one very important thing, along with a few treasures that came with it.   
  
Slowly but surely, the largest door to the huge, square-shaped building slipped open to reveal things not seen by most people in close to twenty years. Personal things, mostly. Things like a shelf of awards and trophies, inventions and a case of patents as big as most people`s beds. A shining red convertible, an old hoverboard passed down through the ages...   
  
But all of these things paled in comparison to just what the genius who now used this place had come for. Numerous pieces of weaponry and equipment, ranging from a simple pistol to the grandest prize in all of the old storehouse.   
  
Doctor Steven Tauros smirked a mirthless smirk, climbing slowly out of his jeep and glancing up at the wonderfully preserved Red Shield Liger. It wasn`t a hard, cold red like the color of his son`s Blade Liger, nor was it the pinkish-red that suited his daughter`s hair color. It was instead a shade of red that was innately soft, dark nonetheless but still very easy on the eye, reflective of light in a strange sort of way. Just like his wife`s hair.   
  
"Never thought I`d be doing this again," he mused in an awestruck tone of voice, slipping his labcoat off and nonchalantly tossing it back into the jeep before flipping the switch that caused the garage-type door to slowly rumble shut over the course of several seconds.   
  
"Never thought I`d be doing this again, at all..."   
  


_ End Chapter Twenty-Three  
  
_

**Author`s Note:** *Cue dramatic music.* :P Yes folks, Steven and Leyon are finally going to settle their dispute in the only way that offers entertaining violence to you! The reader! And expect even more wanton insanity from Kyle and Mark in the next and final part of the Suicide Days.  
  
**EndlessAdventure:** Pierce **might** show up, not sure though. She`s already got one link into the story as is but I won`t say what. And yes, Bit will use the handleblade... But not yet.  
  
**Zinou:** For some reason, I can see Vega having those qualities about him. Maybe it`s how smug he came off as when he was first shown or how quickly he seemed to go through things but I could easily see him mastering a few martial arts out of sheer boredom until he got the Berserk Fury. As we`ve said in the past: Semi-spoiled eleven year old prodigal warrior + 80 ton war machine = A very bad thing.  
  
**ZeonReborn:** *Simply takes away Zeon`s caffine. Then the sugar. Watches his supply of insanity fade away. Wins by default.* :P  
  
That`s all for now folks, Sh33p out and see ya next time!  
  



	25. Lose Yourself

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I do not own Zoids.  
  


* * *

  
  


**New Age**_  
Lose Yourself   
  
_

"You better lose yourself in the music, the moment   
You own it, you better never let it go   
You only get one shot, do not miss your chance to flow   
This opportunity comes once in a lifetime, yo!"  
  
  
2:30 AM, the middle of a desert canyon, and a desert canyon that hardly ever had visitors, be they legit or wandering bandits looking for their next victim. It was typically as empty as an unused glass, but tonight, it was playing host to the variety of sounds that accompanied your average Zoid repair shop, a little less hectic seeming, definately just as loud due to the echoing effects of the canyon itself. A closer look though, showed just how hectic it really was, as two exhausted looking men in their early-to-mid twenties raced around a pair of brutalized Zoids with a frantic pace to their work.   
  
The younger of the two, and the less experienced, was currently hanging by a cord of some sort just in front of a gun with barrels big enough for him to lie down in and have room left over. The double impact cannon of the Shadow Fox had been trashed badly during the battle, but it was nothing a welding torch and a bit of caution couldn`t fix. The curious thing about him was that he also had a phone held lopsided on his shoulder.   
  
"Speak up?!" He yelled into the phone over the roar of the blowtorch and the rumbles of both Zoids, as well as the sound of his partner`s constant switches between jumper cables and a high powered shock rifle that sounded like a crack of thunder everytime it went off. "I said: _Will you be careful_?!" The voice on the other end of the phoneline repeated.   
  
"I`m always careful!" Mark retorted, though his toes were conveniently crossed at the time. "I mean it, Mark!" Abbie`s voice echoed back, barely audible over the roar of equipment in the background. "I know, hon!" Mark yelled back. The two continued chattering on though, even as Kyle, who was standing at the feet of the busted up Shadow Fox, stepped around on the trailer and grabbed another oversized battery - the type usually used to power military-grade plasma cannons - before plopping it down next to the right forefoot of the Shadow Fox, letting out an exhausted wheeze.   
  
The Ivory Liger was settled on the second trailer, laying on it`s stomach with close to a dozen batteries hooked up to it`s wounded side at various points. Unlike the Fox, most of the damage to the Liger, while severe, was relative easy to fix. The Shadow Fox had taken _far_ more complex damage though, requiring a great deal more work to fix.   
  
A groan and Kyle again grabbed the battery, heaving it onto a lift and then climbing up the opposite side of the rope, which was looped around a stabilizer. The effect was that his weight countered and canceled out that of the battery, lifting it up while he climbed up the Zoid`s leg, stopping at a point of major damage to the shoulder and then tying the rope into place before positioning himself to completely stand on the leg, tiredly undoing the jumper cable from around his waist and then hooking it, the battery and the 'wound' of the Fox together before sliding back down the securely anchored portion of the rope and down to the trailer.   
  
It was going to be a long night. Neither of them were likely to sleep, but that was okay. Exhaustion was rapidly becoming one of the few things keeping them awake. Both were hungry, Kyle`s ears were killing him, his legs and arms felt like putty and Mark still needed to wash the blood off of the side of his face and most of the upper left side of his chest and shoulder. All he had to soothe the injury was an ice pack and some gauze wrapped around his head like a bandanna. Both were in need of food, sleep and bathing, but both were putting that on hold until they could finish repairing the Shadow Fox as best they could.   
  
It was going to be a _very_ long night, indeed...   
  
  
Morning. At least Kyle thought it was morning. His sense of time hadn`t ever been very great, but at least the Ivory Blade Liger came equipped with a fairly useful alarm clock. Features most military strategists of old tended to condemn as useless on the battlefield had proven extremely useful when actually applied to it. Among these things were alarm clocks, recliner features on cockpit chairs and built in mini-refridgerators capable of storing things like quick use first aid kits with parts that required cold to be stored properly - or in more frequent cases, carbonated drinks with an illegally high level of caffine.   
  
This was why Kyle Mazemia loved the miniature refridgerator in the cockpit of the Blade Liger. Leaning the Zoid`s forward pilot seat back up again, it only took him a few seconds to flip open the small container hidden on the right side of the cockpit floor, just beneath several more important consoles. After that, he removed one can of Moonbay Cola(a 210 year old softdrink company started by the former racing champion/Ultrasaurus pilot/Gustav trucker of the same name). It wasn`t the same as the Jolt Cola he was used to, but it tasted better and didn`t make him hyperventilate so voila.   
  
His partner wasn`t quite as fortunate, but Marcus Harlock had a way with improvisions. His answer to the fact that he _still_ hadn`t slept even after managing to swipe a quick bath in the river near where he and Kyle had spent the entirety of the night(bar Kyle falling asleep for close to an hour and a half), was to dump three cans of chicken soup into an oversized travel cup after heating it to the extent that it steamed whenever he opened the cup. When drowsiness crept close, Mark took a gulp and found that the burning sensation was more than enough to jar him back awake. Far quicker than a caffine overdose but far more damaging given how it was only just cool enough to not give his mouth burn wounds.   
  
"How`s`a Liger?" Mark slurred out tiredly, to which Kyle yawned before downing another sip of his own drink and twitching slightly. "Says most of the damage is fixed aside from a few paint and armor screw-ups," Kyle answered after several seconds. "And Fox?"   
  
"Bright as a ray o` fuckin` sunshine."   
  
"In other words, he`s only just barely up for the match."   
  
"Something like that."   
  
"We`re screwed."   
  
"... If I had any wit left, I`d use it to humiliate you somehow."   
  
"Newbie."   
  
"... Nnguh..."   
  
The Shadow Fox and the Ivory Blade Liger came to a complete halt after almost a minute further. Both Zoids had spent the better half of the past three hours walking at a slow pace from the canyon to the immense flatlands it happened to gouge through, and both Zoids looked far better than they had yesterday. Fox was still dirty, but it was almost back at peak performance once again. Dents and dings were still blatantly visible all over but they were becoming fainter by the minute, while all of it`s internal systems had been completely self-repaired through the tactic of shocking the Zoid`s systems into fixing themselves quicker. The double impact cannon had been repaired - it was concealed within the chest at the moment - while the laser vulcan gun had been shocked into repairing itself. There was another missile in the Zoid`s load-out as well.   
  
The Liger, for the most part, was in better conditions. Less damage to repair and all. It only bore a few token marks from the shots it had taken to the side the day before, though it still looked a good bit grittier than usual for whatever reason.   
  
An explosion in the distance heralded the start of the coming chaos of the day, as dust and debris shot out of the ground around a newly formed impact crater, the flameless blast causing air to warp and distort as heat severe enough to melt a person alive rushed out around the silver-white Judge Capsule, which extended up and flipped open with seconds to spare.   
  
** "The area within a five mile radius is a designated Zoid battlefield. This zone is now restricted. Only competitors and combat personnel have authorized entry. Danger! All others must leave the area at once!"   
  
**_ "I gotta be outta my fethin` mind..." _  
  
** "Area scanned." **  
  
The consistant pounding noise in the background was soon justified as an Iron Kong, accompanied by a Shield Liger, arrived on the battlefield, moving at full speed to come to a skidding halt just across from the exhausted Suicide Team.   
  
** "Battlefield set up."   
  
** Growls and shrieks clashed, but no shots were fired and no attacks made. It was an intense waiting period as the two teams bid their time, allowing the Judge to continue his speech.   
  
** "The Suicide Team..."   
  
**_ "If we`re going down,"_ Kyle thought, _"Then I`m at least taking one of them with me."_   
  
** "Versus the Heckler Team!" **  
  
Both Heckler Zoids growled in unison. Each was painted in camouflage colors matching the desert, and both were obviously packing enough firepower to level any average opponent, yet it was the combination threat they posed that was more dangerous than just their combined firepower. Iron Kongs were big, tough, slow and powerful, Shield Ligers were _still_ among the fastest, most agile, versatile Zoids around. Together, they could cover each other terribly well.   
  
** "Battle mode 0138. Sub-match one of five."   
  
** "Your streak _ends_ here."   
  
"... Your mom. Peon."   
  
** "Ready?!"   
  
** "We`ll make you eat those words."   
  
"... Your moms. Peons."   
  
** "FIGHT!!!"   
  
** Gunshots rang out, the Suicide Team split and the Heckler Team followed suit, with the Iron Kong doggedly pursuing the Blade Liger while the Shield Liger went after the Shadow Fox with a vengeance, letting off several missile barrages only to dash out of the way when the Fox doubled back and swiped at it. Mark was on his last rope, Kyle wasn`t fairing much better against the Iron Kong.   
  
In an unlikely sort of way, the Blade Liger and the Kong slugged it out with far more speed than would be expect, for even as the huge ape-like Zoid made it`s attacks, the Blade Liger would dive out of the way and try one of it`s own, but neither could seem to gain the advantage over one another. The Kong would swipe out with a fist, the Liger would dive under it and try to get an attack in on the huge Zoid`s vulnerable underbelly only to have to get out of the way fast or get smashed when the Kong drove forward.   
  
"_Strike Laser Claw_!"   
  
The Shadow Fox lunged through the air, but the Shield Liger was ready, throwing up it`s barrier mere fractions of a second before the Fox could finish it`s attack, causing the Strike Laser Claw to jaggedly slash right into a field of energy, holding it back but only just barely, and only for several seconds. When that time passed, the shield shorted out and the attack continued on, but the Liger had just enough time to jump back and try to catch the other Zoid off guard with it`s triple impact cannon.   
  
It missed though. At an impossible moment, the Shadow Fox had taken control and sprang back up off of the ground, spinning out and smashing it`s entire side onto the back of the larger Liger, knocking the Zoid right off it`s feet and slamming it stomach-first into the ground before rolling off.   
  
The Shield Liger rolled away and sprang back up - the Iron Kong crashed face first into the ground, the Blade Liger bounding up off of it and twisting around in mid-air, back booster springing up and shield igniting with a crackle of orange-pink energy. A roar of thrust and the Blade Liger whipped down, twisting like a bullet out of a rifle and slamming into the left shoulder of the Iron Kong as it turned around. It was a particularly fast paced, hard hitting manuever, originally created by Van Fleiheit during a battle with a trio of remote controlled Saber Tigers, but Kyle had put it to use in a different way.   
  
The result was still the same: The Liger`s shield switched off after the Iron Kong flipped over forward onto it`s back exposing it`s vulnerable underbelly to fire from the Blade Liger`s double impact cannon, which tore open massive, gaping holes into the underside of the larger Zoid.   
  
Explosions raged in the distance before the Shadow Fox finally caught the Shield Liger completely off-guard, firing off a pair of high explosive rounds straight into the right missile box of the other Zoid, setting off a chain reaction that blew the Shield Liger right off of the ground and sent it back down with a thunderous crash and a fierce shriek of metal as the support pylon for the other missile box bent and then snapped like a twig, rolling away from the burnt, downed Liger.   
  
** "Battle over! Battle over! The winner is the Suicide Team!" **  
  
"Eat our words, huh?" Kyle asked snidely, resisting the obvious temptation to kick the downed Iron Kong.   
  
Minutes more dragged by as a crew of ZBC-operated Gustavs pulled onto the battlefield and loaded the remains of the angry Heckler Team onto trailers, pulling back out without so much as a word. These were people more accustomed to scraping Zoids and their pilots off the battlefield after mid-battle accidents than anything else, as such, they tended to work with exceptional speed, even if the situation likely didn`t call for it that much.   
  
After they were gone though, a few more minutes passed before the second of the five opposing teams stepped onto the battlefield. The new team was fresh, well prepared and coming to the fight packing the best that they could get their hands on, which meant that of the three Zoids, two were Saber Tigers and the third was a custom Gunbluster, packing four heavy duty gattling guns on it`s back mount, as well as another two six-shot rocket boxes on either side of it`s head, ending the murderous seeming package with a large machine gun on it`s forehead, easily carrying the kind of weaponry that could mutilate most Zoids with terrifying ease.   
  
Kyle and Mark were going to have to somehow defeat this Zoid and the two faster, more agile Zoids that could protect it.   
  
Business was about to pick up, and it was about to pick up in more ways than one...   
  
** "The Suicide Team versus the Hellsinger Team! Battle mode 0138, sub-match two of five. Ready?"   
  
** "... Eheh..."   
  
** "_FIGHT!_" **  
  
"Dibs on fatso," Mark proclaimed with a twisted grin. "... Oh gee, so I get a 2-fer, huh?" Kyle asked tiredly. "If your big white pile o` crap is half as good as Fox knows he`s not, you will," Mark replied. "... Just for that, I`ll off both of them before you finish the big bastard," Kyle growled ferally. "Is that so, Chinny?" Mark asked. "... Yes, Newb. It is."   
  
"Oh ye o` li`le faith..."   
  
"No comment."   
  
"Comment or your mom`s a whore."   
  
"No comment or your girlfriend plays the skin flute."   
  
"Joke about Abbie and you`ll be in a _four_-on-one. With my boot _flossing_ your _kidneys_."   
  
"Noted."   
  
"Concession accepted. Peon."   
  
"Flegh."   
  
"Will you two shut up and fight already?" The leader of the Hellsinger Team demanded, though the rounds hadn`t started flying. Yet.   
  
"... Will your mom ever stop being a 50 cent slut?" Mark asked, shooting off yet another of the 'your mom' cheap shots that he had seemingly turned into a trademark over the past days. "... You are _so_ dead!" The leader yelled. "I guess that means we should hurry up and trash `em, huh?" Mark asked. "... I just wanna freaking end this so I can sleep..."   
  
"Then let`s do it."   
  
The battle began in brutally stylish fashion with an attack that sent both the Fox and the Liger out of the way as bullets the size of trash cans rained down on the ground they`d formerly been standing on, causing both Zoids to trail off in opposite directions, only to be trailed by the two Saber Tigers, who also happened to spread apart from one another, leaving the Gunbluster unprotected but working to keep the Suicide Team from attacking it all the same.   
  
Kyle, the pilot of the Gunbluster figured, wasn`t the most dangerous. Sure, he had what was likely the more powerful Zoid, but Harlock had used people figuring on that arguement at least twice now, and since Kyle and the Liger were _only_ good enough that they could draw fire from the Fox, the Fox was the most dangerous of the combatants. Right?   
  
Wrong.   
  
With the Gunbluster`s attention occupied by the Shadow Fox, Kyle whipped the Ivory Liger around in a frenzy, swinging both blades down and forward. The Saber Tiger pilot, unexpecting of this manuever, was caught completely off guard, getting the Blade Liger`s left blade promptly rammed down his Zoid`s throat, with the attack being followed up by several quick shots from the blaster on that side. The effects were severe, enough that the Saber Tiger`s pilot frantically ejected after having overestimated his chances.   
  
With the damage done both internally and externally, the Blade Liger worked on it`s own to swing it`s booster out of it`s unused position and rotate it completely forward. A quick burst and the Liger rocketed back, withdrawing from the maimed Saber Tiger just as the Zoid turned into an outright fireball.   
  
"One down, Newbie!"   
  
"Your mom," Mark replied, shrewdly rotating the laser vulcan gun 180 degrees, so that it faced backward. After that, he bid his time, allowing the Saber Tiger pilot to draw into a straight line behind him, still trying to avoid fire from the Gunbluster. After that though? The Saber Tiger found itself on the recieving end of a near-constant stream of pulse lasers, the end result of which was the left shoulder being completely eviscerated, with the hip behind it not fairing too much better.   
  
The Saber Tiger crashed to the ground with a disturbing tumble and a roll, but the machine gun fire came to a complete halt. Mark`s ears quickly registered the sound of an intense, brutal impact in the distance, followed by an equally intense, equally brutal sounding explosion and an equally harsh thud nearby. He didn`t have to look to know what it meant.   
  
"You fucking shield rammed him in the same spot all of his ammo was, didn`t you?"   
  
"... _That_ obvious?" Kyle asked.   
  
"... You`re not suicidal -"   
  
"I`m brilliant!"   
  
"- you`re a fucking dolt."   
  
"**_HEY!_**"   
  
** "Battle over! Battle over! The winner is... The Suicide Team!" **  
  
"Two down -"   
  
"- and you`re still a fucking dolt."   
  
"... Gee, aren`t you just Mister Positive?"   
  
"Like a ray of fucking sunshine."   
  
  
"And as the Suicide Team drives through it`s second match in the final five, one can already see the toll this has taken on these two young, dedicated warriors. Yesterday brought them one of their finest moments, but today may yet bring them one of their darkest hours. We`ll just have to wait and see how their next match goes," the newswoman stated. Brad flipped channels after that though, he wasn`t very interested in rookies who seemed hellbent on burning themselves out during the early days of their careers - though Kyle Mazemia wasn`t really that much of a rookie. Brad knew enough about him to know that he was actually a fairly decent young veteran, emphasis on 'decent.'   
  
Decent wasn`t going to cut it if the two of them even hoped to try and take on Naomi and Leon, but then came that nagging fluke once again. Not to mention the sting of the Fox seemingly switching sides with perfect willingness. It was more annoying than actually hurtful, but for a man like Brad annoyance could go a fairly long way. In specific, at the moment he was annoyed at how the two were fluking through so much and at the same time, showing skills better suited to Class A-level warriors than anything else.   
  
"What the hell is with those two?" Brad growled to himself, absently running a bare hand over Naomi`s scalp. The two had fallen asleep late in the previous night, studying up on the moves of the two younger pilots in an effort to help her prepare in case they somehow cracked through the final five of their little four day binge of hell. Obviously, Naomi Fluegel slept far more than Brad Hunter ever would, but that was to be expected.   
  
Smugglers and ex-gang members-turned-mercenary tended to work on little, if any sleep.   
  
"They`re both sleep deprived and crazy. Surprised you`re still here," Leon stated. Brad jerked involuntarily, not enough to stir Naomi but enough to be noticeable at least. The door, which Leon had somehow managed to open without Brad`s notice, was then slid shut, and Leon nonchalantly halted before even taking a step.   
  
"I`m guessing I`ll need to cover my eyes, huh?" He asked with a smirk. "Not really," Brad shrugged. At that, there was a plop and Leon was seated in the chair he`d pretty much claimed as his own whenever he was at Naomi`s apartment. "Moving in, I see," he quipped. "Just too lazy and welcomed to go home, actually," Brad corrected, though his voice lacked the tone that Leon`s held. "How`re they managing so far?" The former Blitz Team leader asked, just as the third team stepped out onto the field.   
  
"Other than the fact that they`re driving me insane, not too bad."   
  
  
** "The Suicide Team versus the Vertigo Team! Battle mode 0138, sub-match three of five. Ready?" **  
  
Two against two. A Helcat and a Guysack against the Shadow Fox and the Ivory Blade Liger. It was a matter of even numbers yet uneven firepower and uneven ability. It was really a stacked deck against the outgunned, outskilled Vertigo Team, and the match to follow showed this with brutal swiftness.   
  
** "_FIGHT!_" **  
  
The Guysack was first. The Shadow Fox held the speed card over even the Blade Liger, proving it in what had become typical fashion over the course of the past few days by slamming headlong into the smaller Guysack before the larger Blade Liger could even finish closing the distance to the Helcat. From there, it was little more than a single hard smack, started by Mark but guided the rest of the way by the Fox itself right into the spot where the Guysack`s head connected to the remainder of it`s body, severing it perfectly and sending the pilot tumbling around inside for several feet.   
  
"I got mine first!" Mark chanted, much to Kyle`s disdain. The Helcat paid a hefty price for the Shadow Fox pilot`s bragging, mainly since Kyle was emboldened just enough to aim a little recklessly. As a result, his first - and only - pass gashed open the cockpit of the Helcat right down through the green glass, perfectly vaporizing it and missing the terrified pilot so slimmly that the man`s jacket singed at the outermost thrreading. From there, the blade continued on, gouging through the Helcat`s neck and then cutting all the way down through the side of it`s body, right out of it`s hind end in a perfectionistic fashion.   
  
That said, the Helcat promptly toppled over and the bell rang for the third time in one day before the Judge spoke.   
  
** "Battle over! Battle over! The winner is... The Suicide Team!" **  
  
"Precision is the name of the game, llama."   
  
"... Precision? **_HAH!_** I doubt you even know what precision means! Or what a llama is!"   
  
"... Precision means hitting the target exactly how you want."   
  
"Then whats a llama?"   
  
No response.   
  
"Wellll?"   
  
"... Oh shut up damnit."   
  
  
"What the heck happened to you?" Bit asked with a quirked up brow as one disgruntled, utterly annoyed looking Jamie Hameros trudged into the room, a mild twitch showing up on his left eyebrow. "She`s stealing my clothes," he muttered, plopping down across from Bit and staring dejectedly at the table between them. "Stealing your clothes? Who?"   
  
"Leena. She`s stealing my freaking clothes," Jamie answered, emphasising the whole feel of his life at the present by smacking his face into the table a single time. Bit`s cereal shook briefly, but for the most part that was all that happened. The blonde in-field leader of the Blitz Team just stared instead.   
  
"... Why would she be doing that?"   
  
"I don`t know. I don`t care either," Jamie answered in a ragged tone, lifting his head back up and smacking it right back into the table. "I just know that it`s almost the straw that broke the camel`s back," he groaned. "What do you mean by that?"   
  
"Keep a secret?"   
  
Bit facefaulted.   
  
"Nevermind," Jamie muttered, again smacking his head into the table.   
  
"Gee, sounds like _you`re_ just having a grand morning, huh?"   
  
"... Kill me," Jamie groaned to himself in defeat.   
  
  
** "The Suicide Team versus the Blackwater Team! Battle mode 0138, sub-match four of five! Ready?" **  
  
"And I thought the Devestators were overcompensating," Mark grumbled in a dull tone of voice as four _very_ heavily armed Iron Kongs lumbered onto the battlefield. Each was practically designed to make up for the failings of the other, there was one with nothing but heavy gattling guns, another with nothing but beam weaponry, another still with nothing but missiles and rockets and the fourth was packing what amounted to exceptionally heavy armor, numerous small thrusters at varying points and only a few guns for short ranged weaponry.   
  
"There`s a mild difference between compensation and outright murder," Kyle replied with the same tone. "... Says your mom."   
  
"... **_WILL YOU LEAVE MY MOM ALONE, GOD DAMNIT?!_**"   
  
"No. I will not leave your mom alone. Why?"   
  
"Why?!"   
  
"Because."   
  
"Because why?!"   
  
"Because _**YOUR MOM!!!**_"   
  
** "_FIGHT!_" **  
  
"I hate you," Kyle groaned out with a dry tone of resignation, even as the Fox and the Liger charged headlong into battle. It was a reckless, suicidal tactic, but then again, they were one of those teams that had an exceptionally _bad_ habit of living up to their team names. "Feeling`s mutual, Chinny."   
  
This time though, the suicidal tactics weren`t cutting it. Both Zoids had made the charge for the Missile Kong, logically reasoning that if they got rid of the best ranged Kong, they`d be able to take a bit of time to rest between attacks. Instead though, they were greeted up close and personally by the Melee Kong, which practically jumped over the other three Zoids and landed right in front of them, smashing it`s exceptionally large, heavily armored fists into the sides of the Fox and the Liger, stopping both attackers dead in their tracks and flinging them back a good ways as a result.   
  
The Liger recovered first, and Kyle quickly sprang the changing tube back up, switching his blasters over to the gattling variants before he`d even gotten his senses back together from the jolt of the Melee Kong decking him. "Eat this!" He yelled, tilting both blades forward and opening fire. The Melee Kong hopped out of the way, and the Beam Kong came into the action, literally shooting down every single one of Kyle`s incoming shots with some sort of interdiction system.   
  
Mark during this time was coaxing the Fox back up to it`s feet as well. A fist-styled dent was obviously visible in the armor on it`s right side, just as there was an equal dent in the left side of the Liger. Unlike the Liger though, the Shadow Fox didn`t have to switch it`s weapons for a gattling-styled attack - but it didn`t use the opening anyway. The look of seeing close to three hundred gattling bolts shot down midway between the Kongs and the Liger wasn`t a very comforting one. Pretty, but still very bad.   
  
"Any ideas, dickweed?" Mark asked, intentionally hanging back still.   
  
"You could always kamikaze them. Then I`ll uh... Heh heh, co-" "Don`t finish that sentence." "Spoil sport."   
  
"Seriously though, any ideas?"   
  
"We can try and corral the big bastards into one spot. How big`s that net of your`s?"   
  
"About as big as your mom`s ass."   
  
"... I _really_ fucking hate you."   
  
"Glad to know the feeling`s mutual. As for the net, it`s big enough to knock off one Kong and wrap around it twice, maybe."   
  
"So if you nailed them from above..."   
  
"... Blanket style."   
  
"Exactly," Kyle answered with a smirk. "Brilliant idea-" "Yes, yes. I`m glorious, it`s true." "- but you`re still a fucking jack ass."   
  
That said, the Blade Liger stopped it`s attack, swinging it`s blades down and gearing up to throw it`s shield up while the Shadow Fox began to quickly circle around the group of Iron Kongs, spraying shots off at random and trying to herd the Blackwater Team into one tightened space, an action which the Blade Liger soon joined, charging forward with it`s shield at full and circling the quartet in such a close, quick way that even the Melee Kong couldn`t effectively hit it.   
  
"See anything I can jump off of?" Mark asked finally, still taking pot shots at the four Zoids. "Not really," Kyle answered darkly, just then realizing how much their plan had relied on something that the Shadow Fox could jump off of in order to blanket the four of them.   
  
Unfortunately, his brooding also suffered from an interruption of it`s own as the Melee Kong came out of it`s rest, swinging down and nailing the Blade Liger in the back at just the right moment to avoid getting smashed by the shield or skewered by the blades. The Liger roared out in pain and skidded to a halt on it`s stomach, but at the same time, Marcus intervened once more.   
  
The Shadow Fox skidded along to a dead stop, firing off several ordinary rounds into the barreled chest of the huge Kong, causing no real damage but at least shifting attention away from the downed Blade Liger, which was slowly getting back to it`s feet. In near unison, the entire Blackwater Team - bar the Melee Kong - opened fire on the Shadow Fox, hosing down it`s entire general area with enough firepower to shatter the tip of a mountain like nothing.   
  
Luck was the only saving grace of the exhausted rookie. Luck and the sheer speed, skill and reflexes of the Shadow Fox itself. He was too worn down and surprised to even try to move the Zoid, but it made up for that on it`s own, eagerly dodging through every stream of bullets, individual bolt of plasma, laser, missile, rocket, bomb, fireball and anything that passed by in between, until finally, after roughly thirty seconds, the vicious barrage came to a stop, leaving behind only a single enormous ball of flame, shrowded in solid black smoke.   
  
During this time, the Ivory Blade Liger was getting smacked around by the Melee Kong, even though every shot only succeeded in hitting shielding rather than the actual Zoid itself. Kyle was only just barely beginning to get his senses back together but that was still good enough to allow him to make a reasonable effort at mounting a comeback, hitting his thrusters everytime an attack came and slowly wearing down on the Kong`s heavy fists like a pair of hammers striking each other repeatedly.   
  
"Newbie?" Kyle asked finally, glancing sideways over at the enormous fireball on his left, even as the remaining Kongs shifted their attention over to him. There wasn`t any answer either, Mark wasn`t responding. "Crap," Kyle growled to himself, dropping his shield and practically running up the arm of the Iron Kong, just as it`s blades picked up an especially brightened glow, the result of an intense surge of energy.   
  
One pass and it was over for the Melee Kong. The head and cockpit of the Zoid both tumbled free of their admittedly stumpy neck, landing with a roll a small distance from the stiffened body, which promptly toppled over itself as all of it`s stability and balance mechanisms shorted out. The Blade Liger continued on though, springing off of the Kong`s shoulder at full speed before twisting into a barrel roll and swinging it`s blades to point forward. The result was that none of the Kongs were able to draw a specific beed on any particular section of the Liger, able to see only a blur of orange, white, black and gold, though that came to a swift, lethally precise ending as the Liger touched down, blades stabbing through the elbows of the Missile Kong before repeating the process for the knees as the Liger ran forward, passing under the collapsing Iron Kong just quickly enough to avoid being crushed.   
  
"Rotten bastards," Kyle muttered, swinging the Liger around on it`s foreclaws and turning to face the two remaining Iron Kongs, which met him not with a witty retort, but only with gunfire. In a flash, Kyle threw his shield up and made ready to attack, but he never got the chance.   
  
"**_STRIKE LASER CLAW!_**"   
  
"What the hell?!"   
  
In a blinding split second, the Shadow Fox, wrapped in smoke like a fireball itself, erupted out of the area it had apparently been hiding in, catching both Kongs completely off guard in a single move, severing the arms of thefirst and outright tearing a hole through the second before skidding to a hard stop on all fours a good distance away. Both of the remaining Blackwater Zoids promptly toppled over at the same time, completely disabled from anymore fighting.   
  
"_How the hell did you do that_?!"   
  
** "Battle over! Battle over! The winner is... The Suicide Team!"   
  
** "Awww, did da widdwe bishounen think Mawkie and Foxy ded?"   
  
"... Fuck you, alright?"   
  
"**_HAHAHAHA!!!_**"   
  
  
"He hasn`t shown up yet, Obscura. You`re just taking up space and posing a potential risk to our security - now _leave_," the warden of the prison ordered for the umpteenth time. As he had for the past two or so days, Vega merely ignored him.   
  
Until he heard the sound of several dozen fairly heavy guns - military issue, anti-Zoid level no doubt - locking down on the general position of the Storm Fury. Vega stopped ignoring them, and he wasn`t alone.   
  
** Please tell me they did not do that. **  
  
_ "They did that. Calm down."   
  
_** If they open fire, Kale won`t be the only one they have to worry about...   
  
**_ "They won`t. They`re too afraid,"_ Vega answered coldly, resolving to play off of what he rightly guessed as fear to make a few quick statement and explanations... And at least one thinly veiled threat.   
  
"I`ve been sitting here for two days for the specific purpose of protecting this place from an enemy who can and happily _would_ slaughter the lot of you pathetic beaurocratic ingrates just for kicks, and you have the outright indecency to point guns at me? _Well excuse me_!"   
  
"Uh..."   
  
"And if you so much as _inch_ that trigger near firing, you won`t have to deal with _just_ Kale, let me and my pal here assure you of that!"   
  
The sounds of guns slowly inching away from being aimed at the Fury filled his ears, and Vega let out a satisfied smirk to himself before leaning back again and closing his eyes. _"Told you so,"_ he bragged to the Fury in typical eleven year old fashion. The enormous Zoid only gave a small growl - still loud given the sheer size of the Storm Fury - then quieted down, settling back into the wait and not moving an inch, the same way it had been standing for almost two and a half days now.   
  
That time was only just beginning to take any sort of toll though, Vega hardly even gave enough of a damn to eat more than once a day with infrequent snacks scattered the rest of the way over. He was one of those geniuses who`s eccentricity manifested more in his eating and sleeping habits than in social contact or anything of that nature. That and Vega had an unhealthy infatuation with Zoids for a boy his age, but that was beside the point.   
  
_ "I`m waiting for you Kale... Come and get me..." _  
  
  
** "The Suicide Team!"   
  
** "... This..."   
  
"Yes. This is bad."   
  
"_Very_ bad.   
  
** "Versus..." **  
  
"Fuckfully bad."   
  
"Agreed."   
  
"How the hell are we going to get through _this_?   
  
** "The Cataclysm Team!" **  
  
"Good question. Any ideas?"   
  
"Just one."   
  
"And that would be?"   
  
** "Battle mode 0138!"   
  
** "Tuck our heads between our legs and kiss our asses good-bye."   
  
"Better than mine."   
  
"What was your`s?"   
  
** "Sub-match five of five!"   
  
** "You _don`t_ wanna know..."   
  
"I`ll take your word for it.   
  
** "Ready?!"   
  
** "You take the big one..."   
  
"They`re all big!"   
  
** "_FIGHT!!!_"   
  
** The response to the ring of the bell was an eight fold shockwave of air followed by an even louder explosion as the two members of the Suicide Team dashed back, beating a hasty, almost frantic retreat only to be followed by trails upon trails of high powered machine gun rounds, each of which quadrupled on itself at every single point. There was no respite in the assault, it was continuous, brutal and focused, forcing the two Zoids into a single spot and then smashing the area with eight more massive explosions.   
  
The two Zoids in question were the innumerably outgunned Shadow Fox and Ivory Blade Liger, who`d had trouble with only one Gojulas. At present, it had to deal with four of them, all of which were highly modified variations to the original design, at least one of whom was packing a shield generator and all of whom had their Supercannons on semi-pivoting mounts that allowed them to compensate for the slow movement of their Zoids so long as the enemy was at a range.   
  
To put it bluntly: Marcus and Kyle were screwed. Not in a nice way, but in that way that could make someone go 'AH! DAMN! MAH ASS!' like Cartman on South Park. The last Gojulas they had fought was almost completely basic, it`s only real notable attribute was that it`s paint scheme had been all black. These Gojulas were all modified, and every single one had the same level of endurance as the first one, with at least one bolstering it thanks to a shield generator. All had quad repeater cannons on their arms, all had leg mounted rocket launchers and all had two batteries of light machine guns on their stomaches, each of which could pivot some thirty degrees to either side, independent of one another.   
  
That basically allowed them to put two walls of firepower out and then close them on a line that would then be smashed to burnt out, glassed over dust with the Supercannons.   
  
Against this, Kyle and Mark were only able to rely on a combination of luck, recklessness and a wanton will to actually survive the battle.   
  
"_**GET BEHIND ME!**_" Kyle yelled over the roar of eight massive explosions going off yards behind the two Zoids, bringing the Blade Liger around. Mark already knew what the other was going to try, he thought it was nuts and he wasn`t afraid to speak against it. "Can your shield even take that kind of abuse?!" He demanded, even while bringing the Shadow Fox up behind the larger Blade Liger.   
  
"... I honestly doubt it," Kyle said after several seconds, the lulls between Supercannon shots almost over.   
  
"... Then I guess it`s time to live up to the team name."   
  
"Eh?"   
  
"**_ONWARD, LEST I JAM MY FOOT UP YOUR ASS!_**" Mark declared, which the Shadow Fox gladly backed with a howl, charging after the newly envigorated - not to mention mildly irate seeming - Ivory Blade Liger.   
  
"You`re all nuts," Kyle muttered, pulling back on the controls and then moving his hands into the appropriate pattern before sending them forward again. In a burning instant, the Ivory Liger`s shield ignited, at the same time as three Supercannon rounds slammed violently into it. It took every ounce of thruster power that the Zoid had, but the force was nullified after several tense fractions of a second, and the two Zoids continued onward at the Liger`s full speed, machine gun rounds blasting away at the pinkish half-dome of plasma in a vane attempt to wear it down.   
  
The two came closer and closer to the four Gojulas, and then the entire Cataclysm Team - a group that was only in Class B because they were one win shy of Class A - opened fire with their Supercannons once more. Again, the Liger was stopped dead in it`s tracks, and this time it`s shield hovered perilously close to giving out, actually blinking after the first four hits took effect, with the other missing by inches and smashing into the ground behind the Fox. The Liger`s shield flashed back to life though, and even if it had been on the verge of skidding back before, it didn`t this time.   
  
Instead it continued on, and just as it was about to shield ram one of the two center Gojulas, the huge Zoid flashed a bright orange and Kyle found himself ground to a hard fought standstill, with the larger Zoid shoved back by only inches from all of the weight and power of the courageous Liger and it`s pilot.   
  
For a second the two shields clashed brightly together and then they canceled each other out completely. Then...   
  
"_**NOW!**_"   
  
"**_STRIKE LASER CLAW!!!_**"   
  
The Shadow Fox came. Like a raptor, it leapt the distance at the shieldless Gojulas, coming up from behind the Blade Liger and making it`s despite, double clawed attack on the huge Zoid`s neck, both foreclaws striking in at the same moment, held ahead of the rest of the smaller Zoid and trying hard to cut the throat of the larger. Several tense seconds passed and -   
  
"**_FUCK!_**"   
  
- the Shadow Fox`s claws slipped, the Zoid slammed hard, shoulder smashing right into the burnt looking, inches-thinner throat of the Gojulas with all of the weight of the smaller Zoid behind it. The enormous black-and-white Zoid tilted back ever further for several seconds as the Shadow Fox fought a desperate battle, standing it`s hind legs on the other Zoid`s actual wrists and clawing futily at the mounts for the Gojulas` Supercannons, even opening fire at point blank with it`s double impact cannons.   
  
"Fall over you big son of a bitch!" Kyle ordered, swinging his blades forward and opening fire. Thankfully, he had left his blasters in the gattling configuration, that meant he was given just enough raw speed to make up for the lack of actual force behind blaster-type weaponry. Seconds more went by as the three remaining members of the Cataclysm Team finally tried to step in, having avoided helping their comrade because of the slow speed of their Zoids. Viciously, the Fox continued though, swinging it`s laser vulcan gun until the barrels rested between the open jaws of the huge Gojulas and then -   
  
"**_ADIOS, MOTHER FUCKER!_**"   
  
- an explosion of pulse lasers ripped through the back of the huge tyrannid Zoid`s head, supressed only by the warping of armor before finally, the entire neck of the Gojulas bulged slightly and turned a hot red. The Fox sprang back and the huge Zoid`s mouth slammed shut while the cockpit practically tore open with a roar of miniature rocketry as the pilot ejected, the bulge in the neck expanding until smoke poured out of the Gojulas` mouth, and then the entire head outright tore into a fireball, sending shrapnel flying as the enormous Zoid toppled over sideways, practically bouncing off of another Gojulas and landing with a twist on it`s stomach.   
  
"One down!" Kyle exclaimed proudly, jumping back as the Liger`s former position tore into a blast of machine gunfire and then opening fire on the machine gun ports of one of the remaining three Gojulas. It was an utterly futile effort, the guns didn`t explode, moving quickly enough to track the movements of the Liger, but then -   
  
"What the hell?!"   
  
- the entire area around the three Zoids became nothing but a black cloud of smoke as the Shadow Fox made use of an oft-neglected tool: It`s smoke dispensers. Marcus Harlock`s piloting of the Zoid differed greatly from Brad Hunter in that respect alone, if not in the other blatantly obvious areas. Unlike Brad, Mark used the dispensers with relative frequency, while Brad used them only when he wanted a twisted kick out of battering his opponents when they couldn`t see him.   
  
For Mark, it was a sure sign of desperation - and strategy. If the Gojulas couldn`t see them, that meant they had a few seconds to recover at the least.   
  
"Nice move," Kyle commented drearily, breathing hard and taking one of the few moments they probably had left to try and pop his ears back to normal. The sheer force and sound of the Supercannons going off so close had actually altered the air pressure in the cockpit of the Blade Liger, enough that his ears had popped in a pretty painful sort of way. "Not too shabby yourself," Mark replied finally, satisfied that the cloud of smoke wouldn`t be going anywhere anytime soon.   
  
"How long you think that`ll blind `em?"   
  
"Long enough. I`ve still got my net, too."   
  
"Use the damn thing then!"   
  
"What the hell do you think I`m doing?" Mark asked, just as the Shadow Fox padded over to the Liger and turned around, aiming it`s tail into the cloud and then firing it`s net off. In an instant, one of the Gojulas roared and then there was a loud ***THUD*** as the huge Zoid toppled over, completely disabled.   
  
"Now what?" Harlock asked. "Now we think of something else... _Fast_," Mazemia answered in an intense tone of voice. "Such as?" Mark asked again, bringing the Fox around with a hop and then waiting. Kyle was silent. Heck, the whole battlefield was silent.   
  
And then...   
  
The silence was shattered and the veil of black torn apart as one of the Gojulas fired off it`s Supercannons at random, coming perilously close to annihilating the Judge Capsule as a result. The other followed suit in the opposite direction, and then a sweeping movement of machine guns did the rest, literally plowing the smoke away until it was little more than a light, black fog with two towering, beastly figures standing at the center, both practically staring down at the two smaller Zoids.   
  
The reaction from the Suicide Team was said in unison, plain and obvious.   
  
"_Oh shit_."   
  
As one, the Gojulas roared and fired their Supercannons. In the same moment, Kyle and Mark leapt back, and as they did, the ground their Zoids had been standing on erupting in flames, a fireball rapidly enveloped by a pillar of burning black smoke, which itself was soon torn open by a hail of machine gunfire. Again, Kyle and Mark dodged, and again the two Gojulas split their fire to try and wall the two in. It was a futile effort though, they were moving too fast.   
  
Kyle grimaced, Mark winced and the two Gojulas hit home again, knocking both of the other Zoids off their feet for the briefest of moments before they each touched back down, with the Liger showing a bit more balance and executing a perfect landing on all four feet while the Shadow Fox displayed it`s superior speed and agility, swinging around on all fours and reversing it`s momentum in such a way that it was put on a byline for one of the enormous Cataclysm Zoids, charging in with a recklessness that could only be described as raw _in_experience and utter exhaustion.   
  
A quick whir of machinary and the laser vulcan gun churned to life with a speed that defied it`s own mechanical limits, opening fire on the right Gojulas with a hail of pulse lasers, supplemented by as many double impact cannon shots as could be taken during the frenzied rush. The Gojulas barely rumbled, it was designed to withstand the recoil of two Supercannons while firing every other forward weapon in it`s arsenal as it took high impact shots from perhaps dozens of foes.   
  
To put it bluntly, Mark and the Fox could try but the Gojulas and it`s pilot weren`t going to move a single freaking inch.   
  
Then again, it didn`t need to.   
  
Four shots, two solid explosive rounds and two lengthy bolts of plasma. The first two slagged outer layers of armor, the third punched a sizable dent into the plated alloys even as the after effects of the first two impacts caused the armoring of the throat to start melting. The fourth shot was the kill shot, punching a two foot wide hole in the throat of the Gojulas and rebounding inside before hitting what amounted to it`s jugular, causing the powerline to literally snap in two before exploding with the same bulging effect that had blown the head off of the first Gojulas.   
  
That left one.   
  
Mark circled around the falling Zoid, coming up directly behind the survivor and gritting his teeth, his own Zoid already gathering up reserve energy in it`s foreclaws, no longer allowing the laser vulcan gun to fire as it closed in on the remaining Gojulas.   
  
"**_Strike Laser Claw_**!"   
  
The huge Zoid threw it`s head back and roared in pain as the Shadow Fox gouged it`s claws fiercely into the Gojulas` back, trying desperately to cut through layer upon layer of time tested, quasi-indestructable armoring in vane. "We can`t get through!" He yelled, while Fox finally gave in and raked it`s claws down the spine of the huge Zoid, to the base of it`s tail. A second passed and the Fox executed a sideways corkscrew, repeating several times with several different jumps before coming to a stop and swinging it`s laser vulcan gun around again.   
  
"Then allow me," Kyle finally said, swinging the Ivory Liger`s blades down into the way that they had always been meant to be used, swinging them straight out to either side. The Shadow Fox only growled, both for itself and it`s pilot, before opening fire, trying to distract the Gojulas for at least a few moments as the Ivory Blade Liger came charging in at full speed.   
  
"**_END O` THE LINE, PAL!_**" Kyle screamed, swiping the right blade straight into the stomach of the Gojulas, said blade seeming to intensify on impact. But the armored hide of the Gojulas was legendary for it`s durability - it didn`t yield. Seconds passed, and the Blade Liger seemed to hang in space, slicing into the body of a foe who wouldn`t give in even the slightest of ways. It seemed as if the Gojulas was going to puff it`s gut out and just throw the Liger back, but then...   
  
"**_STRIKE LASER CLAW!!!_**"   
  
In a blindingly, deafeningly intense clash of gold against gold, energy against energy against armor, the Gojulas virtually snapped straight in half, the upper body flying free for several seconds before slamming down with every ounce of weight that you could expect from it, even as the Blade Liger and the Shadow Fox landed with matching skids in opposite directions of each other, both Zoids roaring and shrieking matching cries of victory audible from miles away.   
  
** "Battle over! Battle over!"   
  
** "That..." Kyle began.   
  
"Was fucking..." Mark continued.   
  
"Whacked," Both finished.   
  
** "The winner is..."   
  
  
** "_Nice_," Bit commented, eyes wide at the sight before him on the television.   
  
  
"This should be interesting," Leon stated to himself with a wide, almost abnormal looking grin. Even Brad was taking notice of the crazed finish the two younger pilots and their Zoids had pulled out of thin air. It was utterly spectacular, and more than a little grating on the ears given how shrill the Shadow Fox`s vocals were. Naomi - who had formerly still been asleep - stirred somewhat, leaning up straight with a yawn that stopped halfway at the sight of Leon actually having an expression that bordered on outright excitement and Brad having a look of morbid amusement blended with actual surprise.   
  
"Did I miss something?"   
  
  
** "_THE SUICIDE TEAM!_"   
  
** "Good job, Newbie," Kyle stated, swinging the blades back into neutral with a smug grin visible from three miles away.   
  
"Not bad yourself, Chinmo. Not bad at all..."   
  
A brief silence and then, both members of the Suicide Team erupted into fits of outright maniacal, sleep deprived laughter. Of course that didn`t last too long...   
  
"That reminds me..."   
  
"What?" Kyle asked, stopping instantly at the overly pleased tone from his begrudging team mate.   
  
"I won the bet," Mark answered with what amounted to an audible smirk. "Which means you get to pay for dinner... Regardless of how much we eat."   
  
"... Crap."   
  
  
Midnight, roughly thirteen hours, three baths, lots of sleep, more face stuffing than can be rightfully imagined and a good deal of mutual backpatting, insulting and a few formal introductions later, Rev`s Diner, Farentown. Four people gathered in a bar, two connected by blood, two connected by an intimate relationship and three connected by a growing friendship.   
  
Kyle Mazemia and Marcus Harlock sat like kings at a royal banquet, settled at the counter of the resturaunt with one Abigail Summers sitting rather frantically next to Mark, fussing over the semi-dirty gauze taping that was wrapped around his head like a bandana, and one Harabec Davids currently throwing food at the two conquering heroes as fast as he could cook it. The four had been doing nothing but catching up, eating and making up for lost time over the course of the past two hours, but now the conversations were winding down.   
  
"... And then, _then_ he gets all ballsy and goes 'end of the line!'" Mark repeated with a disturbing snicker, though Kyle seemed utterly unphased. He knew why his comrade in arms had picked the place, and it wasn`t _just_ for Mark`s girlfriend and uncle, it was also because Marcus just _happened_ to know that the prices were relatively high compared to a typical fast food joint. That was okay, the food was comparitively better by far, but really...   
  
"That`s real nice an` all, but I think it`s time you three head out," Harabec stated with a light yawn. "Yeah, I wanna get rested up and change this damn bandage," Mark agreed, standing up from his seat with a stretch. Abbie followed suit annoyedly. "You should`ve cleaned it better," she complained with a worried tone, tip-toing along to try and get a better look at his still severe seeming head wound. "It`ll be okay hon, you`re here now, right?" Mark asked with a reassuring tone, sheepishly trying to avoid eye contact when her expression fell serious.   
  
"Who`s payin` for this?" Harabec asked before any of the three could leave.   
  
Mark turned to Kyle, who stood up rather nonchalantly and then turned to him with a devilish little smile.   
  
"Mark said he would since he`s trying to be such a good boyfriend to Abbie and all..." He exclaimed cheerfully, watching the green haired waitress`s expression shift from annoyed and concerned to pleasant. "And since he also wanted make a good example that he`s responsible to his uncle and everything..."   
  
Harabec almost burst into laughter. Mark only twitched before letting out a devilish smile of his own and turning to Abbie.   
  
"Did I mention he let me take a hit or two during one of the matches?"   
  
"**_WHAT?!_**"   
  
The sound of a stainless steel frying pan warping around the skull of Kyle Mazemia wasn`t too long in coming.   
  
  
Guardian Force Women`s Maximum Security Prison, the border of the Guylos Empire. Midnight was an especially dark time here, but now it was about to become infinitely darker. Slowly, almost painfully, Vega`s eyes drifted from his lap to the buzzing console at the front of the main screen, watching a distant speck at the very edge of his scanners. A speck that was closing fast.   
  
It was then that he knew. The Fury didn`t have to tell him, Vega already knew who and what it was, he had known hours in advance as it was. The prison alarms were going off the hook, Vega paid them no mind.   
  
_ "It`s time,"_ he thought with resolution and guile beyond his years, uncrossing his arms from around his chest and taking the controls in hand. Fury rumbled slightly in accord, red eyes lighting up brighter than a blood moon as the Zoid that nobody was supposed to defeat began to walk forward, step by determined step. The prison guards were mobilizing in force, but neither Fury nor Vega cared.   
  
The Geno Saurer was closing in. Fast. Vega could almost hear Kale laughing to himself.   
  
  
Within a black cavern, glowing eerily with walls lined in near solid, neon blue, something stirred. The cavern was located deep in the heart of the only non-volcanic mountain for miles in all directions, yet outside it was a frigid mixture of hellfire and tainted ice. The mountain was nameless, it hadn`t been touched for decades but like most of the territory deep within the Dark Continent.   
  
Nyx. It`s mere name had been a death threat in Ancient Zoidian.   
  
The only expeditions to Nyx had been during the frantic last months of the Ancient Zoidians themselves, and again during the days when the Guylos and Helic militaries alike were seeking expansion. The first expedition by the Zoidians had been doomed from the start by the so-called Sea of Witchery, the Daras Triangle. All expeditions after that had simply found the place so inhospitable that it was abhorent to even breathe the foul air, and too dangerous to set up a permanent base or city.   
  
The last who had sought to turn Nyx into anything but an unsafe storehouse for weapons of mass destruction had been the Dark Kaiser`s people, who had converted one of the mountains to an active construction site for almost half of the Kaiser`s forces. They had abandoned it when Gunther Prozen was absorbed by the Death Saurer`s core, which in turn was absorbed by Hilz and the Death Saurer itself.   
  
For close to a hundred and fifty years, the only activity on Nyx had been the night when a funeral had taken place amongst a Zoidian, her companions and her dead lover. A skeleton still sat, buried beneath the spot that It had been hybernating.   
  
But now, activity stirred once again. It could sense it. It could sense others as well. The Old Guard, and new ones. Ones it hadn`t felt since the Great Sleep. It was quasi-immortal, still young by the standards it lived by, but no doubt it was formidable, old enough to know what was going on, and powerful enough to feel the strings of conflict slowly wrapping around the world once more.   
  
The Dark Continent was becoming active again as well, It sensed the movement of another Mind. A Mind dangerously like another that It had dealt with in the past. But It also sensed something else.   
  
The strings of conflict wrapped tight indeed. One conflict in particular.   
  
So it begins anew...   
  
The neon blue walls of the cavern flashed purple, and a streak bolted through the sky into low orbit...   
  
_

End Chapter Twenty-Four  
  


_

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**Author`s Note:** *Cue Papercut.* It`s time for the rematch from Hell! >D  
  
**Zinou:** Yep, Kyle and Marcus are fucking lunatics :D As for Naomi kicking him out for a while... Heck, I doubt he minds too terribly. He **did** guess that she and Brad will be an item within two weeks, after all... And as you can see, Vega certainly wasn`t disappointed, but this one`s going to have quite an... Adverse effect on how things may continue >_> And please do forward the mail if ya would, and while we`re off the topic of the story: What MP3 is it? @_@?  
  
**ZeonReborn:** There`s a point when a running gag gets a smidge overdone dude :P And as for cheap shots and insults... Expect them to be missing from most of the next chapter. Kale and Vega aren`t exactly insult-prone after all...  
  
**EndlessAdventure:** Yeah, Leyon and Steve are gonna end things. I`m actually looking forward to that almost as much as I am to Vega and Kale`s rematch, if only because of how intense it`ll hopefully be. And yeah, it`ll be interesting to see the Suicide Team vs the Fluegel Team... Not sure what to call the chapter though, but 'Suicide Days Revisited' is kinda begging to be used for it :P And you were almost right. I was considering making Leyon`s Saber Tiger blue but now I`m kinda caught between using solid black or dark blue.  
  
And that`s all for now. Expect a few days extra for me to get the next chapter out, but until then: Sh33p out and see ya next time!  
  



	26. A House Divided, History Repeated

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I don`t own Zoids.  
  


* * *

  
  


**New Age  
** A House Divided, A History Repeated   
  
  
  


The furious rattling of alarms were what stirred her awake before anything else could even begin to happen. Claxons were buzzing and searchlights were being shined all over the perimeter of the enormous prison facility, even as the prison`s own formidable defensive force of Command Wolves, Dibisons, Pterases and Iron Kongs were mobilizing in a rush like no other. Sarah Obscura groaned to herself tiredly, thinking for a moment that it was just another ill timed security venture before the shock of her own memories came back to her with all the raging speed and fury of a smack in the face.   
  
Solitary confinement hadn`t broken her spirit, it had softened her resolve a bit but it was unbroken. It had, however, dulled her mind`s former speed just a bit, enough that it took her several seconds to revealize what was about to happen outside. She`d been asked to tell Vega to leave herself, several times in fact. The reward would`ve been movement to a more sheltered cell, even the chance at parole. She knew both were false promises though.   
  
Standing up on tired legs, the middle aged mother of two rushed in a frantic haze to the small, fourteen-by-fourteen inch barred window, the pane for which she had left up for the time being. At least this place offered open-and-shut glass for the windows, too bad the bars weren`t the same.   
  
Either way, her view was a tragically good one. She was going to have a front row seat, almost, to the second battle between her sons.   
  
And it was tearing her apart already.   
  
"... No..."   
  
  
"Took you long enough," Vega stated with bland impatience as the Fury lumbered forward. The Geno Saurer was still a small distance away, but that didn`t matter. It was close enough for Vega to easily pick out the Zoid`s color scheme of black and dull gray, close enough for him to pick out it`s individual teeth and close enough for him to make out the exact width of it`s legs against the background glow of it`s thrusters.   
  
"I was enjoying the scenery... You know, take a little break here and there, slaughter a few helpless people on foot..."   
  
"You`re lying Kale. You don`t have a sense of humor."   
  
"You`re right. I don`t. So why don`t we just shut up and finish off what we started last time," Kale shot back eagerly, the Geno Saurer`s thrusters cutting out and the Zoid effortlessly gliding along above ground for several seconds before planting it`s daggered feet into the ground and skidding to a slow stop, just outside of Vega`s melee range, about one football field away.   
  
"I`m ready for you this time. I won`t lose," Vega stated with a determination matched only by his rising dislike - outright hatred, in fact - of his own older brother.   
  
Kale only chuckled, low and threatening. Murderous. "All you did was change the armor on that tin can you call unstoppable. Hell, why not just brag like a dumb ass and give away all it`s capabilities?" Kale asked, utterly mocking the tendencies of people like Doctor Leyon, who often unintentionally revealed what their equipment was capable of before a battle ever started.   
  
It was Vega`s turn to chuckle, just as low, almost as threatening and possibly even more murderous than Kale`s had been. "Do you think I`m that dumb?" He asked. "No, but I do think you`re stupid enough to stand around trying to act big and tough when you`re neither. In case it hasn`t dawned upon you, I`m fresh. You`ve been waiting for two days straight, I doubt you`ve used the bathroom and I know you lack the foresight to bring any food."   
  
Vega facefaulted to himself. Kale had read him like a book once again.   
  
"And so you know, my target was the Count. If you hadn`t shown up here, none of this would have ever happened."   
  
"... You _bastard_," Vega growled. "I`m not a bastard... Just a murderous psycho out to kill you," Kale retorted with an almost audible smile, just as the Geno Saurer roared it`s challenging cry and charged forward, pausing at midway only to jump straight up. Vega was expecting it this time, bursting the Fury up on an intercept course and trying vanely to snap the Geno up in his pincers, but Kale was too quick, countering the younger Obscura`s speed and power with raw agility and skill, using his legs` thrusters to barrel roll out of the way and land somewhere on the Fury`s right.   
  
Vega touched down with a loud, thundering impact, and the Fury elicited a terribly threatening growl.   
  
**_ LET`S DO IT! _**  
  
"Still relying on the Organoid system," Kale chided, just as the Storm Fury whipped around under the full power of every thruster system on it`s body, almost like a tornado. The Geno Saurer kept it`s back turned though, leering threateningly at it`s larger, more powerful counterpart. "I have friends. You have enemies."   
  
"I have skill. You`re a pathetic amatuer."   
  
"Let`s see how far that skill gets you now," Vega growled.   
  
The following exchange was lightning quick, brutal and fierce. It started with both Zoids charging one another, ending the rush in a pair of sideways headbutts, fast and violent, harsh enough to make sparks go flying, both Zoids` heads rebounding away from one another only to make the dual impact occur again a second later with the same results, flinging Vega around in the Fury`s cockpit, though it was restrained this time. He`d learned from the mistakes of their last battle, it wasn`t going to be a free flying repeat of the hell that had happened last time.   
  
Less than a second after the two impacts took place, Fury roared and struck out with it`s pincers. The Geno roared equally and hurtled backwards, with both dual sets of blades clashing against each other with a flare of sparks, ending on either side of the Geno Saurer in a double X-type pattern, frozen for all of an instant as Kale let loose his own attack, lunging forward and snapping the Geno`s mouth shut fiercely on the head of the Storm Fury, only to have the larger, more powerful Zoid defiantly fling it straight into the air.   
  
Clawshield arms swung straight up, pincers whipped wide open and triggers were pulled. Both pulse cannons shuddered and four bolts of plasma capable of gutting anything short of a Saber Tiger rippled through the air at sub sonic speeds, but Kale was still too fast. The Geno Saurer`s impossible flexibility came into play again, and the large Zoid`s legs spread wide, thrusters kicking in and tail snapping upward, causing Kale to flip forward at a key moment.   
  
All four shots blazed by and slammed together at a convergence point in the air above and behind the now-falling Geno Saurer, exploding brightly. Kale again fired up the thrusters, jetting his Zoid backwards and down, landing on the ground in a hop and a skid, then bending forward and unleashing a hail of fire from his back`s cannons.   
  
Vega charged forward heedlessly though, swinging one shield arm forward and blocking each pulse of firepower, then swiping in the equivelent of a backhand. The Geno Saurer roared in surprise, sparks flying from the shield`s impact, but Kale`s reflexes were a split second faster than Vega`s swinging blades, whipping the Geno to the side and right out of the way, just as the blades finished slamming shut. Kale landed with a loud pair of thuds, but the Geno was already being forced to react ahead of time, one clawed hand firing out on it`s steel line, lancing through the air.   
  
Vega was the quicker this time, getting his right shield arm up and smacking the claw away, then lunging sideways at the Geno Saurer. Kale lunged as well, but his method was a dodge, whipping beneath the enormous bulk of the Storm, landing on both feet in a crouch and then jumping backwards. It`s hand already returned, Kale whipped the Geno Saurer into a hard, tornado-like spin, just as Vega landed broadside to his charging foe.   
  
The Fury whipped to the left and tails slammed together like swords, causing another onslaught of sparks as the impact drove them apart, only to slam together twice again an instant later, the second time with the Fury`s tail grazing upward in a parry-like motion, then sweeping downward at the same time that the Geno Saurer`s tail zig zagged back up, avoiding the impact and causing it to smash into the ground. Dust flew up, the Fury literally blasted forward on all thrusters. Vega hoped that the Geno would be caught in the burn of his jump, but Kale had countered the move in kind, bringing his Zoid`s own thrusters to full power at the same time and rocketing away.   
  
In unison, both brothers turned until they ran parallel to one another. That completed, both let out mirroring yells, both Zoids echoing the effect with roars of challenge and hatred, charging diagonally at one another and slamming together. The smaller Geno almost bounced off but the larger Storm was shaked, both Zoids spread apart and then repeated the impact before skidding to a halt while turning to face on another.   
  
Point blank, the speed of the battle came to a vicious, hateful conclusion. Kale was finally caught unprepared and the Geno paid the price, caught exactly between the serated, saw-like blades of the Fury. The action halted instantly.   
  
The Geno Saurer was pinned. Not pinned to the ground, but pinned to it`s location. The blades had come to their absolute minimum for space from each other, ending up only inches wider apart than the width of the Geno`s neck. Vega smiled ruthlessly, slowly guiding the Geno Saurer where he wanted it as if it was on a leash, keeping his right pincer arm held back and ready to strike the death blow if need be.   
  
Kale only laughed.   
  
  
Sarah`s eyes widened in fear. Not for herself, but for her sons. Kale, as crazy and murderous as he was, was still _her_ baby boy. Vega was, even more so since he was so young. It was a tense moment, silent and cruel for the mother of the two combatants. They were her children, they should`ve been growing up together, experiencing life as true siblings, with a mother and father watching over them from the start.   
  
Instead, they were trying to murder one another. Their father was dead by their mother`s own order, and their mother was in a maximum security prison, forced to watch the battle with no real escape save her own tears, and the bottom of the window which she found herself staring at a few seconds later.   
  
_ "This wasn`t supposed to happen..."   
  
_  
"Think you`ve got me, don`t you?" The older brother asked in utter amusement.   
  
Vega only responded with cold, merciless silence, the double pulse cannon of his left arm slowly beginning to come aglow.   
  
"Well then, Vega..." Kale trailed off. "Finish me."   
  
** Yes. Lets finish this.   
  
** Hesitation.   
  
"Come on! What`re you waiting for, _little brother_?!"   
  
Silence.   
  
"**_FINISH ME OFF!_**"   
  
Finally a response.   
  
"... I have you where I want you Kale. I don`t have to kill you, I just have to force you out of the cockpit and let the Guardians take you in. I`ve won. Get over it."   
  
Another harsh laugh.   
  
"You idiot. In case you don`t remember-" Kale interrupted himself with a brief pause. At the same time, the Geno`s clawed hands extended out, up and locking firmly around the throat of the larger Storm Fury. "- the Geno Saurer`s arms may be short, but these electrified tow lines aren`t."   
  
"Shock me and you fry yourself. The electricity will jump right into your Zoid`s head," Vega guessed, perfectly correct since his blades were so close. "Do you think I care?" Kale honestly asked.   
  
"... What?"   
  
** Don`t listen to him. He`s trying to play off of your emotions.   
  
** Vega still hesitated, until finally...   
  
"That`s what I thought," Kale exclaimed dryly as the pincers slid away from his Zoid`s neck, his own claws retracing a second later. It wasn`t because he was feeling honorable, Kale could care less about that pathetic attribute, but it was more because he was enjoying himself. He was having fun toying with Vega`s emotions, reading the younger fighter like a book and then yanking pages out on a whim.   
  
"Go. I won`t stop you if you do."   
  
"You can`t stop me anyway Vega. I`ll _always_ be better than you."   
  
"_Surrender at once_!" Echoed a dozen voices in a dozen different locations as the entire security force for the prison lined up like a shield wall, all guns lowered on Kale and Vega. "We won`t give you a second chance!" The leader exclaimed threateningly. "... Leave," Vega ordered. "You`ll only get in my way."   
  
"It`s a bit late for that Vega. I`m going to have to kill them now. And then I`ll kill you. And then mommy dearest," Kale exclaimed. Before even Vega`s sharpened reflexes kicked in, the Geno was airborn, springing up over the Storm Fury and using the back of it`s head like a diving board, catapulting itself straight for the line of something along the lines of thirty high powered, military-grade assault Zoids.   
  
"**_DON`T! GET OUT OF HERE, HE`LL KILL ALL OF YOU!_**" Vega screamed, the Fury stumbling forward and finally coming to stabilize itself as screams started to echo over the comm. By the time he had finished jumping around, eight Zoids had fallen, another two went down an instant later. The kills were precise, Kale wasn`t taking his time and annihilating the entire area as he undoubtedly could, he was aiming solely for the cockpits of the Guardian Zoids. Claws tore through cockpit armor, men were skewered alive on blades bigger than their own bodies and gunshots rippled through the air in futile desperation.   
  
In seconds though, it was over.   
  
Hell`s bells rang in the background, Vega was mortified. Slowly, sheathed in fire like a demon from the Ninth Circle of Hell, the Geno Saurer rose. Surrounded by downed Zoids, it`s claws tinted a horrific shade of crimson, fresh and dripping as the tyrannid Zoid began to lumber away from the burning wreckage, and away from the prison as a result. Slowly, ever so slowly, the Geno Saurer stalked towards the Storm Fury, and with it, Kale stalked towards Vega.   
  
"You can`t hurt me," Vega muttered to himself, genuinely afraid for one of the few times in his admittedly short life. "Is that so?" Kale asked, low and menacing. Fury stepped back, but only because Vega forced it to. The Geno stepped forward though, like a hungry wolf having cornered a lamb. "You can`t hurt me," Vega affirmed, more to himself than anyone else. Kale`s response was sheer silence, but the Geno Saurer opened it`s mouth and growled, raw and hateful.   
  
"_You. Can`t. Hurt. Me._"   
  
Another step back, met with another step forward.   
  
"Who said I had to hurt you to kill you?"   
  
The process repeated.   
  
"Who said I had to even hurt you... To kill her?"   
  
The straw fell, the camel`s back broke and the Fury seemed to lit up, stomping forward and narrowing the distance with each passing moment. The ground rattled as the two Zoids approached each other, and where there had been fear, now there was only disgust, courage and anger. The Geno slowed, the Fury took another step forward, imprinting it`s enormous foot into the ground.   
  
"I," a pause. Another step. "Won`t," another pause and another step with it. "Let you," the two Zoids were almost nose to nose now, both poised to make the death blow, both completely unguarded. Kale`s nose mounted guns were locked onto the top of the Fury`s cockpit, Vega`s dual pulse cannons and pincer claws were set to eviscerate the entire Geno Saurer on a whim.   
  
It was a tense moment.   
  
Two minds met, two warriors played a game of chess mixed with Russian Roulette, but the six shooter was a fully loaded shotgun with a barrel on both ends, and both Kale and Vega had their fingers on the trigger.   
  
"Where`s your skill and power now, _brother_?" Vega asked, a ruthless voice carrying the words.   
  
"Getting ready to lodge themselves up your ass," Kale answered, unintimidated in the last.   
  
Seconds passed.   
  
Then all hell broke loose as Kale and the Geno jumped back, clearing Vega`s blades by inches. The Fury covered the next seconds almost on it`s lonesome, putting one foot forward and then almost performing a ballet-twirl on it, smacking the smaller Geno Saurer right across the side of the face with it`s tail before igniting it`s leg thrusters. In a blinding instant, both blades on either arm swung out of view and the Storm Fury lunged sideways, slamming it`s right shield arm straight into the right side of the Geno Saurer, almost knocking the smaller Zoid back.   
  
But the Saurer held firm, defiantly smashing it`s own tail across the unshielded stomach of the Fury, sending it to skid back. Another blur of movement - the Geno Saurer flared forward, it`s thrusters at full power. The Storm Fury was almost ready, but almost wasn`t good enough. A loud clash of metal against metal and two enormous gashes were raked into the left shield of the Fury, the result of Kale`s first pass. Vega didn`t stick around for the second, blazing forward and into a wide angling turn, which evolved instantly into something like a skater`s twist as the Fury hopped up and swiped at the Geno with it`s tail.   
  
Kale was too quick though, bringing his Zoid to duck under the Fury`s tail and then skidding to a jet-powered halt sideways, blasting straight off the ground and causing Vega to miss badly in an attempt to catch him with a leg-mounted machine gun burst. The Geno Saurer was airborn, Vega landed and swung his gattlings up, trying in vain to hit Kale with streams of armor piercing rounds. Everytime he got close, the Geno Saurer impossibly dodged, either by bursting up and forward, down and back, outright barrel rolling and even sideways looping out of the way with every close call.   
  
And then the Geno touched down, dashing forward once agan and taking a vicious, random bite at the Storm Fury`s throat. Vega was too quick this time, rocket jumping over his attacking brother and touching down a good distance away, but he`d been caught completely off guard once more when the Geno Saurer twisted around and slid to a dead stop, bending forward.   
  
Kale pulled the triggers and the Fury was nailed four times in a row with his brother`s heavy cannons, knocking the Fury out of the air and slamming it to the ground on it`s side. The enormous Zoid was downed, but not out.   
  
Kale rocket jumped forward this time, but Vega was ready, hitting his thrusters and scraping along sideways on the ground at close to two hundred miles an hour before an errant burst from one of the leg thrusters flipped the Storm Fury up onto it`s feet the long way. By then, Kale had slammed to the ground, both of the Geno`s clawed feet would have disemboweled the Storm had Vega been any slower. As it stood, both Zoids came to a menacing pause then.   
  
In unison, they turned to face each other.   
  
"How much of this is skill, and how much is the armor change?" Kale asked, arrogant with his tone as he was with his words.   
  
"It`d be the same no matter what armor I used. Give it up Kale, you can`t win this time."   
  
Two loud clacks and the Geno Saurer went rigid, mouth opening wide as a solid white sphere of energy built up at the tip of it`s Charged Particle Cannon.   
  
"Really? I`d be willing to bet money that you haven`t got access to a shield right now, and if you dodge, the prison`ll get hit."   
  
Vega facefaulted and looked behind himself. Kale was right. Without even realizing it, Vega had put his back to the prison with Kale right in front of him. He still had options, but they were thin, dangerous as well. The first was to try and hit Kale down the throat of his Geno Saurer, but that held the adverse risk of a chain reaction that`d probably end with a low level charged particle blast, still intense enough to kill everyone situated in the facing side of the prison due to the rather... Disheartening effects that raw charged particles could have on human beings.   
  
Another option was to try and close the distance and pull a Liger Zero - shoving the Geno Saurer`s cannon straight up and changing it`s aim. That was a promising one, but Vega doubted he had the speed. Fury wasn`t willing to risk it either, but there was still one other option left...   
  
_ "Here goes,"_ Vega thought. Fury fell silent. Strangely silent.   
  
Two more clacks, louder than those of the Geno Saurer. In the same way, the Storm Fury went completely rigid, mouth opening wide as the panels of it`s tail flipped open, a similar sphere of energy gathering up at the tip of it`s own Charged Particle Cannon.   
  
"I won`t let you, Kale."   
  
"Don`t get it, do you?"   
  
The entire area went near solid silver-white, tinged just the slightest with a dull blue, green and purple. Both Zoids continued building power, and despite the lead that Kale had, Vega`s Zoid showed it`s reserves more effectively, powering up just fast enough to close the gap caused by his own hesitation. The spheres of charged particles continued growing until they were the same size and then -   
  
"**_I CAN`T LOSE!_**"   
  
- the Geno Saurer fired, it`s beam of death clearing to halfway a single blinding instant -   
  
"**_NEITHER CAN I!_**"   
- only to halt dead in it`s tracks three quarters of the way to it`s intended target. Beams clashed, silver against silver, outlines against outlines. Sparks flared off like lightning, the sheer force of the duel caused the ground beneath to start glassing over from excess heat, slowly carving out a vicious black trench from the force at the heart of the collision.   
  
From the start though, it was obvious that for raw power, Fury was king. With every ounce of effort he could spare, Vega forced the Geno Saurer`s charged particle beam back with his own, the central spot where the two attacks met warping to a fine, bright shade of solid white. The entire area seemed to follow suit, all color fading to nothing more than black and white from the sheer intensity of the duel. The sound overtook almost everything, deafening in it`s own intensity to the extent that almost nothing could be heard.   
  
Almost nothing.   
  
A fell cry filled the air as Vega began to fully overtake Kale, his beam pushing the Geno`s back a bit more each second.   
  
** It can`t be...   
  
** Vega`s senses were flooded by a feeling of shocked panic from the Fury, even as a pale streak bolted into his view, a definate outline of purple aura around a white hot core, visible even in the deafening, blinding intensity of the duel he held between himself and his brother.   
  
With agility that defied both comprehension and conventional laws of inertial physics, the ball of energy streaked around like a comet, stopping on dimes and performing straight edged, right angle turns until it seemed to land on the ground in front and to the right of the Geno Saurer, seeming to form a vague outline. Demonic, it was, solid black like a skull with white eye sockets, pausing with absolute impunity to the ferocity of the clashing energies mere yards above and beside it.   
  
It leaned forward, and the fell cry returned, a warrior beast`s call as the thing shot ahead, like a straight bolt of lethal energy, streaking alongside Vega`s charged particle beam as if it wasn`t even there, corkscrewing around it and finally -   
  
"**_NO!_**"   
  
- tearing the Fury right off the ground. One impact, and the bolt had done it`s damage, forming up into a sphere after smashing into the Storm`s barreled chest, then erupting away once again, just as Vega`s beam sent off into space. Kale`s attack went through unabated, striking the Fury and all but consuming the larger Zoid in a blast of raw energy powerful enough to annihilate even it.   
  
All it would have taken was a split second more. But Kale stopped. The charred black Berserk Fury toppled over backwards and rolled along hard, landing awkwardly on it`s stomach as the world returned to it`s original dark coloring of the night time. The bolt again appeared, this time landing like a little demon on the left shoulder of the Geno Saurer.   
  
It was near solid black, for some reason Vega felt as if it`s color had darkened through the obvious years. An air of raw power and ferocity seemed to pour from it, an aura that could be denied even less than it could be understood. Cold, malevolent blue eyes, strikingly vicious and utterly hateful set in it`s dragon-like head, four matching crests rising from four points, two from each cheek, two like horns from the back of it`s head. Wings of a matching black and the dull greyish/purple tint that had once been the color of most of it`s body were visible on either side of the creature, folding into it`s back maliciously as a voice so very unlike anything Vega had ever heard filled his every sense.   
  
I have returned, Specular. Exactly as I said I would.   
  
Something stirred in the Fury, and for the first time, it spoke in a voice that Vega had never heard. It was old, distinctly female and layered with a combination of robotic, human and animal undertones to it, almost like fifty voices speaking as one.   
  
** Shadow... **  
  
"Shadow?" Vega asked dimly, feeling the rush of emotions as if they were his own, and even more than earlier, it was scaring the hell out of him.   
  
** Your time has ended, Shadow. Go! Back to the abyss that we left Him to lie. Go back and stay there! Until you finally learn the error of the rage you feel! _GO!   
  
_** Vega and Kale both let out mirroring screams, and everyone in the prison soon followed as the demonic Organoid showed what was only an inkling of the power he had accumilated since coming of age. It was a dangerous fact that Shadow had always been the youngest Organoid after Zeke, but unlike Zeke, Shadow hadn`t ever permanently bound himself to a Zoid - the kind of bond that lasted to the death of the Zoid in question. Like all Organoids, he was quasi-immortal, and with every year that passed, his heart grew darker. The rage of His passing had marred a scar so deeply that Shadow had spent the years in a great sleep, surrounded by Zoid Magnite.   
  
The end result was that Shadow, the Organoid with the most true potential, had come to his full power. His body had darkened with his heart, his eyes held a cold, blue malevolence to them and his teeth even looked sharper. Like an onyx demon from Hell, he stood, glaring viciously down at the fallen Storm Fury, and with it, Specular and Vega.   
  
Old fool!, he spat in that strange telepathic voice, layered even more thickly than Specular`s. It was like a chorus of unbridled hate for all that lived and breathed when He was already long dead.   
  
Old fool! This is my time now! Long, I have waited for another like Him to return, I will wait no more!   
  
**_ GO BACK!   
  
NEVER AGAIN! THIS IS MY TIME NOW, OLD WENCH! THE WORLD WILL KNOW OUR PAIN!!!   
  
_** His brain felt like it was on fire,but Vega found the resolve to squint his eyes open and raise his head, even as static clogged much of the image on screen. With a murderous howl, the Geno Saurer slowly tinged purple and then, just as Shadow had arrived, he left, taking the entire mass of the Geno Saurer with it, vanishing in a blaze of light like a bolt of lightning into the skies, heading for low orbit and a further destination that Vega and Specular both did not know.   
  
And Kale went with them.   
  
  
"What in god`s name just happened?" Sarah asked in shock, watching in accute pain as the Geno Saurer practically vanished in a ball of light, leaving behind a brutalized Storm Fury and dozens of trashed Zoids on the side as well. _"Why didn`t Kale finish him off?"_ Was her first thought, followed seconds later by: _"Vega! Is Vega alright?!"_   
  
To her amazement and relief, seconds later, the cockpit of the battered Fury flipped open and out stumbled a juvenile form, exhausted to say the least. Sarah breathed a sigh of relief for her second son, but it was also a sigh of terror for the future of her first. She had heard the strange words from the Organoids, trembled like everyone else at the sheer tone of Shadow`s chorus-like voice, and watched in muted horror as it had all happened. The pain in her head was agonizing, it hurt just to think, but that didn`t matter.   
  
All that mattered was that Vega was alright and Kale was hopefully going to be as well. For the mother of both warriors, it was a hopeful sign and a heartbreaking one as well.   
  
With nothing left to say or do, Sarah Obscura fell to her knees, wracked with tears and regret.   
  
  
Down on the ground though, Vega held his head in one hand and propped himself on the Fury`s charred snout with the other. The Zoid was still torturously hot at parts, but that was mostly it`s underbelly, not it`s head. If the head had taken any direct damage, he was more than certain that it would`ve killed him. A distant burn was visible in the night sky, between the two moons of Zi.   
  
It was the Hammerhead II. Stigma had sent the crew to get him.   
  
"I guess it could`ve gone worse," he thought to himself aloud, falling into a seating position with a loud wheeze.   
  
** No. It couldn`t have,** Specular replied in Vega`s own voice once more, though it was still obviously different enough to tell apart from his own thoughts.   
  
"What do you mean?" Vega asked hesitantly, his relief turning to a sense foreboding dread at an instant.   
**  
Shadow has returned, and Kale has gone with him. The darkness has only just begun...   
  
**

_ End Chapter Twenty-Five  
  


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_

**Author`s Note:** Before anything else, allow me to give some credit where it`s due: **Thank you**, Zinou. It had always been intended in NA for Specular to be Vega`s Organoid, if only because having Shadow in that role would`ve been a bit too expected(to me at least). However, without TEoO, I wouldn`t have thought to bring Shadow into the story at all, even though he actually **is** needed for something I had planned from the start. It also lead me to modify a scene I have planned to happen later on, but I won`t spoil it.  
  
Now then: Who else thinks that the shit is about to hit the fan next time Kale and Vega meet up? And who`s the real threat here? Kale or Rommel? Perhaps Arihmanes or Rayth on their own? And how does all of this tie together? Everyone is connected somehow, but just how will it all reveal itself?  
  
Don`t look at me for the answers, I`m a bastard, remember? :P  
  
**EndlessAdventure:** Nyx is actually the name of a place I picked up off of a website(the guy on Artvilla, forgot his name), and later found a pic of it on a map of Planet Zi. I only kept a few of the locations in the map though, but with a little modification, Nyx fit the bill for what I have planned like a glove. And ya don`t need to write down an explanation, actually. I already have the connections for her to enter the story as it is, and I just need to wait for the right moment to bring her in.  
  
**Zinou: _THANK YOU_** for the inspiration :D As for the Kale fangirlism... *Contemplative look.* ... Well, since I`m a TEoO fanboy, I guess we`re even :P  
  
And speaking of Kale, what did everyone think of how he`s turned out thus far/will continue to develop?  
  
That`s all for now folks, enjoy, leave a review and see ya next time! Sh33p out.  
  



	27. Suicide Days Revisited

  
  
**Disclaimer:** Don`t own Zoids.  
  


* * *

  
  


**New Age**  
Suicide Days Revisited   
  
  
  


Early morning, the dormatory shared between one Abigail Summers, Hope Jones and Jessica Takashida. In specific, early morning within the bedroom of Abigail Summers. Mark was half-asleep but he still had it in him to open his eyes, groggy and unkempt as he looked after having slept next to a woman who literally flailed around in her sleep every now and then. Thankfully for him, he was an especially heavy sleeper though, so it didn`t really make any difference.   
  
Sitting up in bed though, the thoughtful realization that Abbie wasn`t there next to him dawned upon his awakening senses, a bit slowly though. Without a word - but instead with a loud, tired yawn, the younger member of the Suicide Team got out of bed, hobbling along on one foot while stretching the other out, then repeating the process a second later as he got to the door. The clock read 9:35 AM, it was Monday so Abbie was at her classes as usual, as were Hope and Jess.   
  
_ "Thank god,"_ he grumbled to himself in thought. _"Don`t think I could stand those two right now,"_ he added, glancing drearily around the living room of the presently empty living space. As it usually was when he stopped by, the place was so clean you could pick out a needle sized dirt stain from a mile away, and the counter top was almost sparklingly clean. Scratching his side a bit, Mark made his way over to the phone and -   
  
  
Kyle Mazemia stirred awake with obvious annoyance, the phone`s ringing blaring into his ears at near point blank. He`d fallen asleep right after a conversation with Kat, so there really wasn`t time for him to drop the phone off the couch or anything like that.   
  
As such, everyone`s favorite prerequisite bishounen gag-whipping boy was more than a _little_ irate when he finally answered the phone. After falling off the couch. And after collapsing the coffee table. And after spilling lukewarm coffee on his groin. After breaking a glass bowl on his rear end in the fall.   
  
"**_WHAT?!_**"   
  
"My my," the voice on the other end said with a lazy, utterly false socialite attitude. "Aren`t _you_ just Mister Good-fucking-Morning?"   
  
"... Gleh.."   
  
"Ah, the sounds of awakening... When Kyle gets anally violated by a bowl of popcorn..."   
  
"... You don`t wanna know how close to right you are..."   
  
"... You`re right. I don`t."   
  
"Glad we agree."   
  
"Pry the pieces of glass out your asshole and get down to where we left the Gustav, I`ll be waitin`."   
  
"Mark."   
  
"What?"   
  
"The match isn`t for another hour."   
  
"Just enough time to scope out the battlefield."   
  
"... I need to pick the shards out of my asscrack. I`ll be there in a little bit."   
  
"... That is _way_ more than _I_ needed to know."   
  
And with that, both hung up in unison, with the older member of the Suicide Team growling to himself and slowly getting off of the floor. It was bad enough that he`d woken up the way he did, even worse with everything that had happened in the seconds following. Rather lazily, and painfully, Kyle made the slow walk to the bathroom, one hand slowly plucking bits of glass from his posterior the whole way there.   
  
  
The hangar was filled with the sounds of near-frantic mechanical work as the brutalized form of the Storm Fury was slowly hauled out of the still nameless Hammerhead II on a specialized Gustav Trailer. The Zoid was an outright disaster to look at - armor had been fused together at some points, outright vaporized in a few others, charred to the extent that the very chemical make-up of it had altered to match burnt tin at others still. The Organoid System had all but shorted out, and Vega couldn`t sense Specular`s presence as more than a vague heartbeat registering only when he could focus clearly enough to hear it.   
  
Right now, he wasn`t able to focus clearly enough. That was for a simple reason, because right now was one of the only times in living memory that Stigma Stoller was actually being angry - which was itself pretty rare since he was such a low key guy most of the time.   
  
"What were you thinking?!" He demanded. Vega only stared at the hulk of the Fury, unphased. "You could have been killed! And what about the Guardians who died? Damn it Vega, _look at me_," he ordered. Vega was again unphased, watching glumly as the armor of the Fury was slowly removed, piece by piece. "_Vega Obscura_," Stigma growled out. "_Look at me, right now_," he ordered again, voice relating a parental sounding authority more than his usual laid back tone.   
  
Vega was still utterly unphased.   
  
At his wit`s end, Stigma drew back and made ready to smack Vega as lightly as he could while still getting the boy`s attention, but he never finished the process.   
  
"I was trounced, Stigma. Right now I`m more concerned with Specular and the Fury than I am with hearing someone`s concerns for me," he stated, never once turning to look back at his current legal guardian. "And if you think you can get away with smacking me to get my attention - I`m only here in your employ because it suits my needs. Hit me and I`ll be out of here before you can blink, Fury or no."   
  
Stigma paused. Vega didn`t speak another word, crossing his arms over his chest and cracking his neck to either side. It was an awkwardly repetitive scene, vaguely similar to one that had played out years before with a younger Stigma Stoller and an equally younger Kale Obscura. Even Vega`s tone of voice was the same. Thankfully, the mechanical crew had been too preoccupied with the downed Storm Fury to even notice the admittedly brief, somewhat one sided arguement.   
  
Stigma turned away with a baleful shake of the head, a chill running down his spine like few he`d ever felt as he made his way toward the exit.   
  
  
The Deldaros Ocean, just south of equatorial tropics on an island that had somehow remained uncharted even in times where Judge Satellites mapped the entire planet constantly to keep up to date. How and why was due to an unusual phenomenon caused by roughly two hundred tons of Zoid magnite located in the core of a long dormant volcano, which was in turn surrounded by an even rarer material known as telicite, the unrefined form of planetelicite. In it`s refined form, it could be used to distort gravity, light, magnetics and even sound.   
  
It`s unrefined form wasn`t quite as potent, but in a quantity as large as the island boasted, it could distort light and magnetics, as well as interfere with advanced electronics, everything from cell phones to infrared cameras, the only truly complex mechanical equipment that worked on the island were Zoids and Organoids. Why or how was anyone`s guess, they just did.   
  
With a loud clash of energy, like lightning in a sense, the Geno Saurer touched down onto the ground, both feet seeming unusually sturdy for a split second before the gain in strength left them, just like it`s pilot and it`s hijacker of an Organoid followed suit.   
  
Kale landed hard, slamming into the ground at an awkward angle and bouncing back to his feet. For a lesser man, it would`ve been a broken shoulder and likely a cracked skull. For Kale it was just a few bruises and a mild headache. Shadow landed swiftly with the sound of beating wings a few feet away, baring his rows of deadly teeth in a lethal threat as those hollow, insanely murderous looking eyes shifted onto him.   
  
Hours must have passed, it was daytime now. Or at least, Kale _thought_ hours must have passed. Perhaps they`d just traveled to a different location on Zi, far enough that it was broad daylight now.   
  
"What do you want with me?" He growled, a vicious calm permeating an equally vicious voice. Shadow shifted from side to side, perhaps uneasy, perhaps just fidgety after the first bits of movement he had done in close to two hundred years.   
  
A partner. Another like Him. Another... Like Raven.   
  
"... I work with no one."   
  
If not for me, you would be dead. Specular and the whelp are beyond you now, they have come together as one...   
  
"I can and will still kill them."   
  
Perhaps. But they will kill you as well.   
  
"I don`t care," Kale spat. "My only concern is vengeance, and if I die doing it then oh-fucking-well."   
  
Vengeance? But vengeance against what?   
  
"The Backdraft Group. Every last one of them."   
  
You think too small, the Organoid stated, it`s many voices echoing in but a whisper compared to the enormous screams of mere hours earlier. Kale was perplexed. "What do you mean?"   
  
Your war is only against a single number. My war is against everything that breathes.   
  
"I breathe."   
  
And He didn`t like Zoids.   
  
A pause. Both seemed to measure each other up, Kale gauging Shadow, Shadow gauging Kale. Neither attacked, but both were wide open in every way. Neither spoke further for a long while, how long was anyone`s guess. Neither blinked, neither moved, neither even breathed.   
  
"What can you do for me?" Kale finally asked, breaking the stalemate into a fairly hostile negotiation. Shadow nodded to either side curiously and then inched forward, but to the Organoid`s surprise, Kale didn`t move forward, back or to either side like Raven probably would have. He didn`t attack either.   
  
Unlock your own potential. You have the same powers as He did, and more inherited from Her. Their blood runs strong in you, you can do things you aren`t even aware of yet, and _I_ can help you draw them out.   
  
"What do you mean?"   
  
This Zoid. You can sense it`s true power, it`s true nature. Can`t you?   
  
"This Zoid is _my_ tool," Kale growled, ominously leering up at the Geno Saurer. The enormous killing machine almost inched back in what could best be described as fear. Fear of an insane looking young man in his mid-to-late teens, who currently bore no weaponry at all. Why or how, Kale didn`t know. He also didn`t care but that was beside the point.   
  
It`s a tool, yes, but so much more... Can you sense it? I know you can...   
  
"How?"   
  
Don`t play dumb with me. I`ll give you the information to unlock your abilities - but not what you already know.   
  
Kale frowned. Shadow was smarter than he had acted at first, not to mention equally as shred as he himself was. He also didn`t have to reach out with his mind to know what was happening to the Geno Saurer, he could tell already, he`d known for weeks. "Something is off with it`s Zoid Core," he stated autonomously, like a robot. Shadow shifted just slightly on one foot and then flicked it`s tail, pointing to the huge Zoid.   
  
Evolution. In proximity to one like you, it`s already begun to evolve. The only reason the Fury hasn`t is because Specular has held it in check. With time, it will evolve simply from having you pilot it...   
  
"Organoids cause evolution, don`t they?"   
  
One of our key abilities.   
  
"Then why do I need you if it`s going to evolve either way?" Kale asked with suspicion. Again, Shadow flicked his tail and shifted from side to side.   
  
You may cause evolution alone. I may cause evolution alone. Together though...   
  
"... I see."   
  
So it shall be then. We need only wait a while longer.   
  
Kale and Shadow stood like that again, for several minutes. Neither spoke, but it wasn`t needed. Even telepathy would have been redundant, because for the first time since Raven, Shadow had found a soul as angry and volatile as himself. Two kindred spirits of destruction had again found one another on Planet Zi.   
  
And the heavens wept because of it.   
  
  
"Nice battlefield," Leon commented offhandedly as Naomi brought the Gustav to a dead stop, forestland and mountains stretching out for as far as the eye could see. "It`ll do," Naomi replied, the cockpit flipping open as the lightly dressed Gunsniper pilot jumped out, her mannerisms obviously more mature and soldierly than the teenaged girl who had long claimed to be her best rival. "Agreed. Any idea when they`ll be here?" Leon asked, follow Naomi out of the cockpit and finding his question answered by a nonchalant thumb pointed to the woman`s right.   
  
"Ah," he voiced in reply, watching a familiar black-and-blue Gustav pulling up onto the edge of the battlefield not too far away. Taking a moment to literally yank the cockpit shut, Leon followed Naomi back to the trailers and climbed onto the one that had the Red Blade Liger standing on it, while Naomi - in her usual nonchalant sort of way - climbed the roll-out ladder that was standard issue for all Gunsnipers, especially since Gunsnipers weren`t Zoids prone to bending down and planting their heads in the dirt like Ligers or Saber Tigers or other more common Zoids.   
  
Several seconds passed between the two, and the Red Blade Liger lithely hopped off of it`s trailer, seeming to be pretty much enthused just to have some movement for the first time in a week. The ZBC had prevented the Fluegel Team from going into any matches while the Suicide Team had gone into overdrive to make it to Class A, trying to ensure that both teams would somehow remain 'fresh' for their battle, even if the two members of the Suicide Team were both recovering from Hell Week while their Zoids were constantly being worked on.   
  
"Want me to cover for you long enough to find a good spot to snipe in?" Leon offered a bit generously, shifting in his chair to get his safety belts and such on, then glancing sideways at the Ivory Blade Liger. _"I was right. It`s a bit bigger than the Red Blade,"_ he observed, so intently that he missed Naomi`s response, catching only the tail end. "Leon?" She asked, equally as observant of his suddenly shortened attention span as he was of the size and color differences between his Liger and the other.   
  
"Sorry, can you repeat that?" He asked, actually paying attention this time. "I said: No, I can manage myself."   
  
"The Shadow Fox beat you before," Leon reminded thoughtfully. "That was when it`s pilot wasn`t a sleep deprived rookie," Naomi pointed out in reply, her Gunsniper hopping off of the trailer after a brief spurt of shifting about and getting it`s sense of movement back. "Still, don`t take either of them lightly. If they`ve gone 20-0 in four days, they`re dangerous enough to handle seriously."   
  
"I noticed that, Leon. I learned my lesson the last time a rookie took me down," Naomi replied, obviously referencing her defeat at the hands of Bit Cloud. "Which do you want?" She asked with the usual pre-battle curteously of letting Leon pick his prefered targets. Given that Naomi`s skill with a Gunsniper was surpassed by only three pilots in Class S, she had no problem picking off any Zoids that Leon didn`t get to or didn`t want. It was all a matter of hitting the small openings where armor had to be vacant to allow for movement. That and hitting stabilizers, whichever happened to come up first.   
  
"Mazemia and the Liger. You _did_ promise Brad one of the Shadow Fox`s legs, after all."   
  
"... What`s wrong Leon, having 'little Liger syndrome?'" Naomi mocked in reply, obviously having noticed the fact that the Ivory Blade Liger was just a bit larger than Leon`s own. She could almost hear her team mate fuming to himself annoyedly in reply, but he didn`t say anything further and she didn`t dig at him any afterward. They were here to win, not play games and joke around. That singular proffessionalism was why they were among the top ten teams in Class A, and why both were utterly focused on leveling the Suicide Team.   
  
Not that Mark and Kyle seemed to bother noticing that little factor.   
  
"**_HEY FOX! GET OFF THE DAMN TRAILER ALREADY!_**" Mark yelled up at the black-and-gold Zoid, which growled in an almost tired fashion and hopped sideways off the trailer in reply, head dipping down as the cockpit flipped open. Mark was already inside by the time Kyle had limped his way up into the cockpit of the Ivory Blade Liger, holding his apparently sore rear end the entire way there and walking like a bowlegged cowboy in the process.   
  
"... Did you _really_... Uh... Yanno?"   
  
"... Yes. I had shards of a popcorn bowl lodged in my rectal cavity. It was egrigiously painful, highly traumatic and otherwise humiliating, but I`m _over it **now**_."   
  
"... Talk about ass butter."   
  
"... Oh fuck you."   
  
"Why me? You`ve already-" "_Don`t. Even. Think it._"   
  
  
Blitz Team base, situated in the desert a few miles from Farentown. A sprawling, surprisingly large facility, it was once owned by the Helic military and later abandoned following the conclusion of the last great war between the Imperial and Republican forces, later purchased a cheap real estate company and then bought a few years after that by a young trio of men who later went on to become the original Blitz Team. Oscar Hameros had given up his rights to the base early on, he was more interested in piloting. Leyon Martin had considered keeping his part of it`s ownership but later quit in disdain after Steven married the woman that Leyon had been smitten with, thus forking over his own share of ownership.   
  
Today, the Blitz Team base was occupied by a new generation of warriors. Leena Tauros, Jamie Hameros, Bit Cloud and the newly returned Brad Hunter, who was currently staring up at the Scout Fox with an air of suspicion to his features. Leena was apparently sulking in her room, Jamie had isolated himself in another way by taking the Raynos out on six hour flights that amounted to nothing but circling the base overhead and Bit was presently walking around stuffing his face with a sub sandwhich that was probably as long as he was tall.   
  
In other words, it was just another day.   
  
_ "I still don`t get it,"_ Brad thought dryly, watching the Fox like a hawk in hopes that it might do something to confirm or deny his suspicious leers at it. He`d been feeling increasingly uncomfortable with the Zoid as of late, to the extent that it had been one of his main reasons for hanging around at Naomi`s apartment - not that the sniper herself wasn`t enough of a lure as it was, but still.   
  
"Something wrong?" Bit asked, wandering boredly into the hangar, mouth half full, the sandwhich he was cramming down his gullet just about a quarter eaten. "Aside from your eating habits, I`m not sure," Brad replied thoughtfully, never missing the chance to pick on his team mate. "... Ah`m noh t`ah bagh, am ah?" Bit asked, mouth completely full this time. Brad flenched.   
  
"You could at _least_ have the decency to swallow your food, you pig..."   
  
"See? I was right when I said he was a shoe-in for you," a voice that caused Brad`s entire body to rigidly straighten up and a slight twitch to form under his right eye as he looked over his shoulder, spotting the one man he had sworn with contempt that he _did not_ want to meet again.   
  
"Oh... It`s you... The dickweasel," Brad grumbled under his breath at the last sentence. "Gee, how pleasant to see you too, shitface," Bram retorted in kind. Bit on the other hand, had his head cocked to the side in a mixture of curiosity and instant resolve.   
  
The two looked as if they could have passed as twins if their hair and eyes were the same color. They even had the same posture and hairstyles, though Bill`s awkward looking spikey mess was shifted to the opposite side from Bit`s, making the two look like distorted mirror images of each other. There was also another thing that bore notice...   
  
"Sandwhich..."   
  
"_My_ sandwhich," Bit growled ferally, holding the sub closer to him in a protective stance. The two narrowed eyes and...   
  
"Nice to see the monkeys getting along," Brad and Bram muttered on the same note as Bit and Bill broke into a brief chase that quickly degenerated into an outright slugging match as to who would eat the remainder of Bit`s food, turning into what could best be described as a classical anime dust ball of violence, complete with wanton screams, random fists and legs flying all over the place and even chunks of debris seeming to materialize out of thin air as the two brawled across the hangar, much to the disturbingly similar annoyance of the two former mercenaries, who also happened to bear more than a slight resemblance to each other.   
  
In unison, both Bill and Bit halted, standing there with each balanced on one foot at an impossible angle, Bit`s free hand planted firmly into Bill`s right cheek and eye, his hand holding the remains of a now half-eaten sub as far away as possible while both glanced in opposite directions, seeming to listen in on a conversation that only they could hear.   
  
_ Kids...   
  
** Kid? I`m not a kid!   
  
** Pipsqueekin` rookie.   
  
** HEY!   
  
**_ "... And I thought just one of them was bad," Bram and Brad commented to themselves at once, just as Borealis hopped into view, glaring up at the Liger with near palpable annoyance.   
  
_ Chibi!   
  
... Oh shut up, you old bastard...   
  
_ "Now, if you do or don`t mind my asking - I don`t care either way, just so you know that - why in god`s name are you here?" Brad asked annoyedly. "Since you guys won`t answer the Doc`s calls, he sent ol` monkey here to issue a challenge. I was guessing on a hunch that luck would be against us and the rest of your sorry ass team would also just _happen_ to be exactly like us. Except for you, we`re nothing alike."   
  
"Agreed. Besides, your hair`s greasier," Brad commented, taking out a cigarette at the exact same moment as Bram. Again, Bit and Bill paused, staring at the two in morbid fashion.   
  
"Nothing alike, huh?" They both asked at once, just before resuming their brawl for the now three-quarters-eaten sub sandwhich.   
  
"Grease has nothing to do with it," Bram finally stated, lighting himself a quick smoke and then continuing. "I just happen to clean my hair... Unlike you," he snidely pointed out. "Greaseball," Brad replied shrewdly. "Do you accept the challenge or not?" Bram asked, cutting to the chase pretty quickly. "Yes. Battle mode 0982, as soon as the Doc gets back," Brad replied, already taking a drag off of his own cigarette.   
  
"See you then."   
  
"You leaving your monkey here?" Brad asked.   
  
"He has an Organoid, he can make his way home alone," Bram answered, already halfway out of the hangar. With a shrug, Brad turned back to the Scout Fox and afforded himself a very private, satisfactory smile.   
  
_ "Nothing alike at all,"_ he thought confidently. He was utterly wrong, but then again, everyone had their moments, right?   
  
As for the aforementioned monkeys...   
  
"**_MY SANDWHICH! BACK DAMNIT! MINE!_**" _  
  
It`s almost funny...   
  
_ "**_STOP HOGGING IT YOU ROTTEN BASTARD!_**"   
  
**_ Eh... Kinda pathetic really.   
  
_** "**_MINE! ALL MINE, DAMNIT!_**"   
  
_ Still.   
  
_ "**_GIVE IT!!!_**"   
  
A random crash of heavy machinery, two loud matching yelp/screams and a flying sandwhich that just _happened_ to bean Brad on the side of the head.   
  
**_ I rest my case.   
  
_** That looks kind of painful, actually...   
  
  
A distant, thundering impact, over a mile away but still clearly audible even at that range as the Suicide Team faced off with the lone Red Blade Liger. Naomi and the Gunsniper had seemingly vanished minutes earlier, mainly since, like any good sniper, Naomi Fluegel was deeply intent on not getting smashed to pieces in the opening seconds. Against Zoids that were built around medium-to-short range combat, and capable of extremely long ranged battle in the case of the Ivory Blade Liger, a Gunsniper wasn`t an ideal Zoid. It was better suited by far to battle at medium-to-long range, standoffs and shoot-outs rather than getting up close and personal.   
  
** "The area within a five mile radius is a designated Zoid Battlefield. This zone is now restricted."   
  
** "No shit," Kyle grumbled. "Aw, is someone still upset?"   
  
"Shut up or-" "- or you`ll cram another _glass_ popcorn bowl up your ass?"   
  
"... I really fucking hate you sometimes."   
  
** "Only competitors and personnel have authorized entry. Danger!"   
  
** "Gee, aren`t you two just cohesive personified," Leon sardonically pointed out.   
  
"Oh totally," Mark replied. "By the way, do you smell that?" He asked.   
  
"Smell what?" Leon asked in reply, though there was a bit of hesitation behind it.   
  
** "All others must leave the area at once. Area scanned..."   
  
** "That my friend, is the wonderful smell, of **_bullshit_**," Mark answered.   
  
"What are you guys on, anyway?" Leon asked. "First popcorn bowls, now bullshit?"   
  
"Oh, Kyle`s the token whipping boy-slash-bishounen, me? I`m just high on life, not on drugs..." Mark answered, an almost audible twitch ringing through in his voice, followed by a cracked grin that Leon could practically hear.   
  
** "Battlefield set up."   
  
** "... You`re both nuts."   
  
"Nah... He`s a pansy, I`m a lunatic. There`s a difference, yanno?"   
  
"... I reiterate: You`re both nuts."   
  
** "The Suicide Team versus the Fluegel Team!"   
  
** There was a lull. Neither side spoke, but both Ligers tensed up somewhat. Kyle was both disgruntled and severely angry, and Mark had fanned the flames of that emotion by ruthlessly degrading him. However, since murdering a team mate wasn`t really an option, Kyle was instead reduced to focusing his complaints on the Red Blade Liger before him, rather than the Shadow Fox beside him.   
  
** "Battle Mode 0982. Ready..."   
  
** "Dibs on Pinko," Kyle growled. "Which pinko?" Mark asked. "The gold-and-red pinko," Kyle answered. A pause. "Which pinko?" Mark asked again. Obviously the fact that the Red Blade Liger and the Red Gunsniper were the exact same colors tended to work against picking one of them out on paint scheme alone, that and Mark was taking a fairly destructive joy in badgering his team mate. Perhaps it was revenge for all the Newbie comments...   
  
And perhaps Mark was just a sadistic bastard sometimes. Not to mention a sadistic bastard who was being rather... Deprived by his girlfriend as of late. Frustrations in the bedroom(Abbie was quite firm about not knocking boots whenever Mark was still injured. That and she wanted him to quit Zoid battling, she had few bargaining chips and that was one of them) tended to lead to outright brutality on the battlefield. A most unfortunate thing for the Fluegel Team to have to deal with, that was for sure.   
  
** "_FIGHT!_"   
  
** The sound of a lightning crack of an extremely long ranged gun overwhelmed the ringing of the Judge`s bell, and before any of the three Zoids who were closest to one another could do a thing, the Shadow Fox was almost downed. The shot had been mind wrackingly precise, to the extent that it was almost like Naomi had been using the two Blade Ligers as a sight for the Shadow Fox, who was standing just enough off to the side that it looked to be standing between them if viewed from the proper angle.   
  
Despite that precision though, the Fox remained in the battle, now bearing a deep gash across it`s underbelly where the shot had only barely missed it`s mark. The round continued on though, reducing a solid oak tree to the Shadow Fox`s left to little more than splinters and toothpicks, half of which had been burnt by the sheer heat of the slug.   
  
"Not wasting any time," Leon stated observantly as the two Ligers started to circle one another. "A quick battle is an easy battle. Surprised he dodged it though," Naomi commented dryly. "He didn`t," Leon pointed out. "It was luck."   
  
"How about you ignore them and put your attention where it matters?" Kyle asked, his blades swinging out into to the slash pattern in an almost fluid sort of motion. Despite the threat, Leon didn`t follow suit, merely studying the other pilot`s technique for several seconds. "You`re overly eager," he stated with a ring of experience.   
  
Mark and the Shadow Fox didn`t stick around to hear the conversation though. If Kyle and Leon had paired off, that left him to deal with Naomi, who had vanished into the thick forestland of the battlefield, or she was located on the nearby mountain, a quarter of which was situated on the opposite side of the battlefield. Whichever it was, the two of them weren`t intent on playing sitting target for her.   
  
In a wild zig zag, the Shadow Fox vanished into the forest, jetting out random puffs of smoke to try and throw Naomi`s aim off. The result was that Leon and Kyle were left alone.   
  
Man to man, Blade Liger to Blade Liger.   
  
"Since you won`t start us off, _I will_," Kyle exclaimed, charging forward with a loud cry. "Definately need to learn to look before you leap," Leon replied in kind, not missing a step and charging forward as well.   
  
  
Dejectedly, a figure sat alone in a bedroom, staring at her right arm. The figure was the shapely form of a fifteen year old girl by the name of Leena Tauros, resident Gunsniper pilot of the Blitz Team. Accomplished in her own right, she`d spent the better part of her lifetime being babied by both her father and older brother, spoiled rotten to some extents. Up until roughly a little under a month or so ago, Leena Tauros had prided herself not only for her somewhat reckless, lunatic style of piloting, but also for her looks, which she often thought of as her strongest trait.   
  
A month or so ago, Leena Tauros had been more than a little bit of a braggart, she`d had confidence that was more often than not pure arrogance.   
  
That had been a month or so ago.   
  
The bedroom was dimly lit, but she`d come to prefer that lately. A month or so ago, her right arm had been just as flawless as the rest of her. Now though? Now she bore a dozen scars, electrical burn marks that were going to be visible right up into her late thirties at best, and this was only on her right arm. Her left bore the same number of scars in an equally random, sickening looking pattern, as did her legs, stomach, back, sides, hips and just about everything else.   
  
A month or so ago, Leena Tauros had jumped the gun in battle with a pilot classified by those who knew him as a raw force of nature. A month or so ago, Leena Tauros` life had only been saved by the fact that most of her clothing at the time was made of a material remarkably similar to rubber. If not for that, she`d have likely died. She`d have also likely lost her hair, but thankfully that had somehow survived. Burnt badly to the extent that the ends were still singed but still.   
  
Her sight wouldn`t ever recover, either. Leena Tauros had once had perfect vision, no she had to have prescription glasses just to see properly. Originally she`d`ve tried for contacts, but Jamie had advised against that. Something about the glasses having a cutening effect that made the few scars on her face stand out less.   
  
A month or so ago, Leena Tauros had been one of the chief warriors on the Blitz Team.   
  
Now? Her confidence in both herself and her piloting was broken, to the extent that she wasn`t eating as much, she was starting to steal Jamie`s clothing since it covered more of her body up than any of her own skimpy outfits, and she was becoming increasingly withdrawn. Bit`s naivete, her father`s blindness and Brad`s apathy didn`t help things. Harry had been M.I.A. for a while, apparently something had gone down involving his mother, and Jamie was increasingly forced to deal with problems of his own, while Naomi was by no means a friend, let alone a confident, and Leon was constantly out of touch lately.   
  
For a girl who had been so very used to relying on others at one time, Leena had found it something of a cold shock to have to rely solely on herself for once.   
  
And as the tears that had been randomly falling for weeks on end whenever she was alone began to seep out once more, it was visibly apparent that the cold shock hadn`t worn off yet.   
  
  
In a forest out in the middle of no where, all hell broke loose as two Blade Ligers slugged it out for one of the few times in history. Both Zoids were moving at a furious pace, almost more fitting of a Class S championshion duel than any mere Class A battle. Kyle Mazemia and the Ivory Blade Liger had come to the battle in top form, as could be expected in this case, and Leon Tauros and the Red Blade Liger were fighting back with at least an equal skill leve, though it was obvious - at least to Naomi and anyone else who`d seen Leon at his best - that the senior Zoid pilot was visibly holding back against his younger counterpart.   
  
Swiftly, the two Ligers ran alongside one another, the Red Blade avoiding getting skewered on the other Liger`s blades in the process, even though it was constantly trying to ram sideways against the other, slightly larger Zoid. Forestland was rapidly being reduced to a combination of splinterered wood and burning brushfires as gunshots rang out, and even more as hyper charged, golden energy-veiled blades swiped through everything in their path.   
  
Then the two Zoids swung to a complete stop, sideways so that they could face one another. Kyle was good, Leon was better, and in a split second, the Ivory Blade Liger stumbled back, four shots raining down on it in rapid succession. By the time the less experienced of the two had recovered, the Red Blade was gone.   
  
"What the hell?"   
  
A crashing of gold against white, the Ivory Liger flew back into a tailspin, recovering swiftly and skidding to a halt on all fours, already turned to face where the attack had come from. It was greeted by the Red Blade, which still held a paw up in the striking position. Ivory trickled sparks out of one cheek, and Red growled forebodingly.   
  
"You`ve got a lot of potential, but you need to learn to anticipate an opponent`s actions."   
  
"Don`t mock me, I already get enough of that from my team mate."   
  
"I`m not mocking you," Leon pointed out as the Red Blade lowered it`s paw, slowly beginning to walk in a circle with the Ivory Liger walking parallel in the opposite direction. "Eh?"   
  
"Mockery of an opponent implies a lack of skill, manners or both, and further implies desperation by trying to verbally goad another warrior into making a mistake when you`re not skilled enough to do it on technique alone," Leon exclaimed, only to catch Kyle completely off guard with another burst of firepower from his dual impact cannons, though the larger of the two Ligers managed to dodge this time, jumping forward and over the incoming shots -   
  
"Don`t forget that other Blade Ligers have shields too."   
  
- and smacking head first into the Red Blade`s freshly activated energy shield, which sent off a shower of sparks and fireballs before the Ivory Liger was slung clear of the Red Blade, smashing sideways into a gigantic tree and knocking it over on momentum alone. Kyle and the Ivory Liger slid along for several seconds before coming to a stop, the larger of the two Zoids laying on it`s side for several seconds.   
  
Slowly, like the predators they were, Kyle and the Ivory Blade Liger stalked towards the stationary Red Blade, which had so far cut them down at every turn without even resorting to it`s blasters or blades. It was like a lion cub with an inferiority complex trying to deal with an amused elder in control of the pride, smacking it`s challenger aside at every attempted strike, outwitting them with every parry, dodge and counter.   
  
But the most grating of it all, was that Leon was so utterly calm about it. This was not the same fiery, charismatic figure that had handed Bit Cloud two of the four fights of his life, this was an overly, almost lunatic calm veteran who almost seemed to be toying with him from every level of battle, both physical and mental.   
  
_ "I`ll take that calm demeanor of his and shove it up his ass,"_ Kyle thought resolutely, tilting his blades forward and making ready for another charge.   
  
  
Off in the distance though, a much more psychological, stealth-ridden battle was taking place.   
  
Two warriors and two zoids stalked one another in the thickest region of the forestland. Surrounded by trees the width of houses and the height of an Ultrasaurus, the land lent itself to a game of hide-and-seek, not the straight up confrontation being carried out by the two Ligers far off, though that battle was still loud enough to ring with echoes even at the range of what had to be at least a mile and a half.   
  
This one was far less personal, to the extent that the combatants had yet to encounter one another with more than fleeting glances of motion blurs and the occasional random burst of gunfire, which typically missed the intended target by a little more than a dozen feet. Naomi Fluegel`s experience was great enough that it made Marcus Harlock`s burgeoning skill, and it was also showing itself to be great enough to effectively cancel out the reaction times of the Shadow Fox.   
  
It had been surprisingly even, but for the moment, the relatively smaller Zoids were seperated from one another by an unknown distance. Mark was breathing hard, not due to exertion but excitement. The Shadow Fox was crouched patiently, hidden from sight by a combination of having it`s back to a steep rise in the ground and more than a dozen especially thick trees forming a straight path in front of it.   
  
A good tactic, no doubt, but not good enough when dealing with one of the best Gunsniper pilots around.   
  
"Game over," a distinctly feminine voice stated, calm and laid back to the extreme, almost a bit smug if not for the underlying lack of emotion behind it. Mark reflexively jerked, and the Shadow Fox followed suit, both looking around.   
  
No shot came. The lone Zoid growled annoyedly, but that was exactly what Naomi had wanted. The sound carried perfectly to her cockpit, indication the Fox`s general location to be about five degrees to the left. A quick swivel and -   
  
  
Another loud crack was audible to the two dueling Liger pilots, followed rapidly by the speech of the Judge:   
  
** "The Shadow Fox is out of the battle!" **  
  
"... Shit," Kyle groaned to himself, realizing just how his chances for a victory had dropped. Not that he would have won anyway, but the opening caused by his momentary distraction was all that Leon needed to finish the battle off.   
  
Precision epitomized the attack, a single, swift and utterly ruthless strike into the base of the Ivory Liger`s head, just behind the cockpit. It had been done with the jaws of the Red Blade, teeth slipping mercilessly under thick, reinforced armor and jabbing into what amounted to the back of the other Liger`s spine. Before Kyle could even react, the Red Blade had finished touching down out of it`s apparent jump, and it had withdrawn it`s teeth as well.   
  
Insult came to the injury though, as Leon roughly smashed the back of the larger Zoid`s head with one of the Red Blade Liger`s claws, driving the already injured Zoid down and further paralyzing the Ivory Blade Liger`s combat and command systems.   
  
** "Battle over! Battle over! The winner is... The Fluegel Team!"   
  
** "No surprise," Mark`s voice carried over the broadband. "Least my solo streak is still intact," he muttered to himself. Kyle merely twitched. "... Just shut up, Markie," he growled. All in all, it hadn`t been a very good day for the senior member of the Suicide Team.   
  
"You did pretty good for someone who`s been as weakened as the two of you are," Leon stated. "Perhaps we can rematch somewhere down the road?"   
  
Kyle only muttered out profanity to himself while Mark yawned. "Anytime you`re up for it... After bishy-boy gets the remaining glass shards out of his ass."   
  
"**_SHUT UP!!!_**"  
  
  
In the desert, over three hundred miles from where the Blitz Team was currently hosting a fairly uninvited guest, and over three hundred and fifty miles from where the battle between Kyle Mazemia, Marcus Harlock, Leon Tauros and Naomi Fluegel had briefly raged, an old structure, mostly abandoned for close to a decade sat alone in the middle of an ancient crater once used as a battleground for the tournaments that had been the prototype of the Zoid Battle Leagues.  
  
The structure was a cage, and in it, two men and two Zoids stood across from each other.  
  
One, a crimson Shield Liger, an equally powerful Zoid to the Leo Master variant, bristling with weaponry and armor and giving a growl ten years in the making.  
  
Across from it stood a dark blue Saber Tiger, armed to the teeth in the literal sense, just as powerful as it`s foe. Unlike the Red Shield Liger though, the Blue Saber Tiger let out a fierce roar, a cry of both defiance and perpetual anger.  
  
Across from one another, two men stood alone atop these Zoids. One was Doctor Steven Tauros, adorned for the first time in a decade or more with a suit vaguely reminiscent of the wear of a Helic soldier, and across from him, on the back of the head of the Saber Tiger, stood Doctor Leyon Martin, wearing instead a uniform that also bore a similar vague resemblance to the wear of a soldier, though his was Imperial rather than Helic.  
  
Within the structure once known as the Cage of Fate, a battle more than two decades in the making was gearing up to happen, and as the old Arena Judge raised up from his hiding place atop a disc placed at the very peak of the huge structure, a harsh wind could be heard, and maybe, if you listened right, that harsh wind carried and underlying sorrow.  
  
** "Battle mode... 0972... Ready?"   
  
** The voice of the obsolescent Arena Judge asked, recognizing only the out-of-date registrations of the two Zoids and the warriors set to pilot them.   
  
Both pilots answered with firm nods, their Zoids roaring the war cry to start the battle to come, and then...   
  
** "_FIGHT!!!_"**   
  


_ End Chapter Twenty-Six  
  


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_

**Author`s Note:** Bit sudden an ending, but I`m kinda eager to hurry up and get the heck off the Suicide Team already x_x; Wasn`t really that satisfied with this chapter at certain parts, but I at least did okay with the Blitz Team scenes(especially Bill/Bit and Zeke/Borealis... happened **exactly** as I had wanted >_>), and I finally got along to starting to build some onto Leena`s rather drastically changed character. And oh, look: I actually took away her good looks! Wonder how many of B/Lers who actually read this won`t like that? :p  
  
And for anyone who hasn`t figured it out yet: Battle mode 0972 is a personal creation: A cage match. There are other... Stipulations and such, but I`ll explain those next chapter.  
  
**Zinou:** Hopefully I`ll be able to return to the whole 'blowing everyone away' thing with the next chapter... Which by the way, is one I`ve been especially looking forward to... >_>  
  
**true platinum man:** Those two haven`t even gotten started yet... Just wait`ll their next few battles.  
  
**EndlessAdventure:** Both. That answer your question? :P  
  
**DJ Wolfwood:** Thankyeh :D I also suggest you check out some of Zinou`s work if you haven`t, especially the whole series she`s got around Vega, Brad and Naomi. Good stuff all around :]  
  
**Rhade:** Yes yes, mindless violence is fun! Fun for the whole family, even little Tod... there... Oy, someone get the spatula so we can pry that kid off the wall... But anyway: I try to keep the OCs from stealing the show too much... Kyle and Mark made themselves an exception, but they were due for a shining moment or three(or five, in their case) like everyone else in the story. Their`s just happened to be the first that came to mind. As for Vega and Kale`s battle seeming to drag on to you, it was probably because Mark and Kyle tend to end their battles pretty quickly... And with lots of witty, semi-psychotic banter on the side. Vega and Kale aren`t like that, so it`s to be expected.  
  
Expect the next chapter to be out whenever the heck I manage to finish it. Leyon vs Steven is one of the key battles of the story, and I`m going to try and make damn sure that it blows you out of your seat six ways to sunday and back again - even if it means re-writing it eight times or more if I have to.  
  
That`s all for now folks, read, review, enjoy and see ya next time! Sh33p out.  
  



	28. When Im Gone, The Duel of Fates

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I don`t own Zoids.  
  


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**

New Age

**  
When I`m Gone  
The Duel of Fates   
  
  
  
Battle mode 0972 was an older mode, mostly abandoned just like 0138 and close to a thousand or more others. It was, like several other battle modes, a battle between two or more sides taking place within a gigantic cage built around a six hundred foot wide, fifty foot deep crater. The difference between 0972 and it`s various counterparts was that it, like many of the older, rarely used battle modes, had the added stipulations that the only way to victory or defeat was surrender or escaping the cage.   
  
The Zoids didn`t have to be intact for either to take place. More than any other, battle mode 0972 had cost numerous pilots their careers, and almost as many had lost their lives. Battles could last for hours on end, and to have battles last for a day or more at a time wasn`t that uncommon with 0972, nor was it terribly uncommon for pilots to climb out of downed Zoids and try to go at it hand to hand, which was where most of the real injuries tended to come from.   
  
What differentiated 0972 from any other cage-styled battle mode however, was that the cage joined the fighting as well. The bars - which themselves were as tough as the heaviest armor on a Gojulas - were randomly charged with enough voltage to turn a cockpit into a deep fried oven, while now-aged, somewhat obsolete machine guns lined the underside of the Judge pod, still functional even after so many years of relentless torment from the local weather and even further relentless neglect by the Battle Commission that had forgotten them.   
  
The Cage of Fate hadn`t taken a life in nine and a half years. Today, there was a very real, palpable chance that it would claim another victim. Or two of them.   
  
With the ring of the bell still fresh in his ears and the sight of the Blue Saber Tiger in his eyes, Steven Tauros cracked his neck from side to side, pulling his gloves tight. It hadn`t always been this way, and it saddened him at what things had come to, but now it appeared that there was simply no other way to settle things. Attempts at conversation failed miserably, attempts at mailing failed even worse, gifts hadn`t worked and offers of friendship hadn`t worked, even the attempted peacemaking when one of the two men was half-dead had not worked.   
  
It was truly a sad day given how close the two had formerly been.   
  
_ There's another world inside of me   
That you may never see  
  
_ Miles upon miles away, in unison, both children of Steven and Rina Tauros blinked and unwittingly glanced in the same direction, and even further from them, Oscar Hameros almost choked on his mid-morning cup of coffee, and just a room away from him, Maria Hameros seized up in the middle of flipping over the pancake she was making for a late breakfast.   
  
_ There's secrets in this life  
That I can't hide   
  
_ "Shall we?" Steven asked, not the faintest hint of hesitation in his voice, though there was still something of a weight tied to it. "Lets," came the answer from Leyon, and in a matter of seconds, the silence that had only been interrupted by an infrequent blast of dusted, desert air erupted into the sounds of gunfire.   
  
The two Zoids and their pilots were evenly matched, even though Leyon had a technological advantage, mainly since Steven had the same combination of skill, reflex and outright patience that his son was starting to show - even if the older Tauros male happened to be a bit loopy sometimes. Blasts of plasma echoed out of the barrels of the two large guns on the side of the Saber Tiger, only to be met with a silver burst of energy from the Liger`s Shield.   
  
With speed and intensity, the two Zoids rounded after one another, dodging away from every incoming shot with skill and speed that had been dulled by years of inactivity, yet still held a very potent edge over anything that even many of the top Class A or mid-level Class S pilots could ever dream of touching. Suddenly though, the Saber Tiger slid to a stop, it`s mouth swinging open and from it issued forth a white burst of light, surrounded and etched into view by a neon blue outline.   
  
The Red Shield Liger narrowly dodged, corkscrewing out of the way in mid-air and going for a classic shield ramming move like the one created by Van Fleiheit. This time, the Saber Tiger slipped out of the way, craftily jumping straight up and twisting upside down, landing that way on the inside of the enormous bars.   
  
_ Somewhere in this darkness  
There's a light that I can't find  
Maybe it's too far away  
Maybe I'm just blind...  
  
_ "**_HERE I GO!!!_**"   
  
The Saber Tiger rebounded before gravity could even take effect, springing back down at the Shield Liger and -   
  
_ Maybe I'm just blind...   
  
_** [**_"Hey! Steve!" A twenty-five year old Leyon Martin called out. The other man, Steven Tauros, had to crane his neck to look back at his team mate from the under belly of the Red Shield Liger.   
  
"What can I do for ya, Leyon?" He asked, loudly enough to echo through the currently half-empty Zoid hangar.   
  
"I... Need a favor..."_**]**  
  
- Steven dodged out of the way by inches. The claws of the Tiger slammed into dirt, but the claws of the Liger hit home as the Red Zoid spun around on it`s hind legs, ruthlessly smacking the Saber upside the head and sending it into a twist through the air. Leyon recovered though, his Zoid landing with grace and ability that defied it`s own design. On all fours and with seconds to spare, the Blue Zoid hunched forward, and Leyon exposed one of his trump cards to the other -   
  
_ So hold me when I'm here  
Right me when I'm wrong  
Hold me when I'm scared  
And love me when I'm gone  
  
"What the heck is going on?"_ Leon asked himself, ignoring completely the bickering between Kyle and Marcus. For the life of him, he couldn`t figure out why Naomi had bothered sticking around to hear the two of them jabbing at one another, her sense of humor was probably more morbid than Brad`s could be at times. He didn`t ask though, and Naomi, for all of her usual observance, hadn`t been paying attention to the strange way he`d become detached in the past minute or so.   
  
_ Everything I am  
And everything in me  
Wants to be the one  
You wanted me to be  
  
_ At the same time, around fifty or so miles away, Leena Tauros asked herself the same question, having yet to take her eyes off of the same direction that her brother was also still staring in. Unlike him though, she found herself staring not at the desert a few miles from where the battle raged, but instead at a currently unlit wall.   
  
_ "Something..."_ She thought in slow unison to her older sibling. _"Something is wrong..."   
  
I'll never let you down  
Even if I could   
  
_** [**_The base`s kitchen, a day and a half later, roughly 3:25 AM. Leyon was gone, renewing the team`s registration and Steven was currently thumping his head against the same table that would one day be used as a skull cracker by Brad Hunter after losing the Shadow Fox to Marcus Harlock in a game of cards.   
  
"Somethin` wrong?" Oscar asked with a yawn, apparently roused out of his sleep, either by his fiance`s recent cold or the one that he himself was starting to come down with. "Yeah," Steven asked between thumps and thuds. "And that would be?"   
  
"I`m trying to write a love letter to someone..."   
  
Oscar perked in disbelief. "You? Love? Is that even possible?" The hispanic man asked in outright surprise, mainly since Steven had a formidable track record of burying his face into his work every time a girl so much as winked at him. "... Still..."   
  
"Need help or something?"   
  
"Can`t come up with the right wording," Steven explained, holding up a half wrinkled sheet of paper that looked like a rough draft. Oscar groggily swiped it and began to read.   
  
"My love for you... Blah, blah, blah... Jesus, Steven. You`re a sappier bastard than I thought..."   
  
"Shut up," the other grumbled. "I could do it for ya, if you want," Oscar offered, crumpling the already battered piece of paper in one hand, tossing it to the other and then dropping it into the nearby trash can. The idea was more than a little appealing, especially given that Oscar had written love letters that had reduced his fiance, Maria, to little more than a puddle of mushy sap and goo in a matter of days - and that had been before he`d ever actually identified himself.   
  
With a small nod, the deliberation ended in under a second.   
  
"Please do," Steven requested tiredly. "Alright, who`s it for?"   
  
"Rina..."_**]   
  
**_ I'd give up everything  
If only for your good  
  
_ - and a blast of what looked like a visual distortion of air slammed into the ground around where the Shield Liger had been standing. The result was a complete negation of gravity for almost two tenths of a second, flinging the hapless Steven for a loop at the same speed as the planet`s rotation, only to have gravity kick back in just in time to yank him back down before his Zoid could be sliced in half by the dull, round cage bars. At almost mach two or three, the Shield Liger smashed into the ground, rebounding back up and skidding along to the edge of the crater wall and kicking up a sizable cloud of dust as a result.   
  
It was only by the grace of luck and chance that the Zoid and it`s pilot hadn`t both been killed by the impact, in fact - Steven`s modifications to the Red Shield over the years insured that it had come through almost unscathed aside from a few dozen superficial scratches and a big dent across the back of the Zoid`s head.   
  
"I see you refined your Anti-Gravity Device," Steve exclaimed between ragged gasps for air. Even if little physical trauma had taken place, it had still knocked the air right out of his lungs.   
  
"Be glad I aimed away from you. You don`t want to know the effect it has on the gravity that holds your sub-atomic structuring together," Leyon replied coldly. Dizzily and exhaustedly, the Red Shield Liger rose back up, shifting uneasily as the Zoid sought to regain it`s own balance. "Lets not make this anymore technical than it already is," Tauros muttered. "Agreed."   
  
Again, the two Zoids began to circle one another -   
  
_ So hold me when I'm here  
Right me when I'm wrong  
You can hold me when I'm scared  
You won't always be there  
So love me when I'm gone  
  
_ "Something wrong?" Naomi asked, finally taking notice of the strange way that Leon had been staring in a worried fashion off in the distance. She also finally noticed that he hadn`t blinked for two minutes straight. "Leon?" She asked again. Still no response, but he finally blinked and shook his head no.   
  
"I don`t think so," he replied in a delayed manner, still looking overly thoughtful. "You sure?"   
  
"I guess."   
  
Naomi quirked up a thin, red brow but said nothing. Leon Tauros wasn`t indecisive unless something was eating the hell out of him, and even then he tended to get over it with a speed that Naomi almost envied at some times and felt glad it wasn`t her own pacing at others. Right now though? Right now she was very correct in reasoning that something was gnawing away at the edge of the man`s senses like a piranha going after the carcass of a dead horse in the water.   
  
** [**_"Bwahaha!" Leyon grinned with an almost insane tone to his voice as he toppled Steve`s forces for the third straight time in one evening. It was raining like a wet hell outside the base, but inside the main hangar - like almost every other night in the huge structure, the sounds of a game to be played were running rampant in the ears of the base`s four occupants. This time, it was a game of Fitz Battling, but usually it ranged from mish-mashed, scrap-constructed simulator combat to old school LAN networking.   
  
Maria and Oscar weren`t too far away, but like most nights since the two had first become an item, the two were more focused on sprucing up the Raynos - one of their mutual passions happened to be piloting. Maria`s own Pteras sat not too far from the Raynos, a stark contrast since it was geared more for pure agility and burst firepower than speed and sustained combat.   
  
A crack of thunder though, and a knock on the door and Leyon paused his celebrations of victory.   
  
"Loser has to get the door," he stated, rubbing in his night of victory. Steven shrugged good naturedly, hauling his body off the floor and stumbling over to the door after tripping on a pipe that had been lying in the way.   
  
Without further delay though, the supposed junior member of the Blitz Team arrived at the smaller, personal door that sat a few feet to the side of the enormous hangar door that outright dwarfed it three or four times over, if not more so. A hand on the knob, a simple flick of the wrist afterward and a tug to follow, and the door swiftly opened to reveal a dashingly beautiful young woman, dark red hair done up in a fairly lengthy, high ponytail at the back of her head, dressed in a long raincoat and holding an umbrella.   
  
"Uh... Here to s-" "I got your letter," Rina Fleiheit stated with a quirky little smile before standing on her tip-toes and outright leveling Leyon and Steven alike, the former by watching and the first by experiencing a kiss so intense that it almost buckled his knees.   
  
Leyon`s winning streak had just ended. Big time._**]**_  
  
Love me when I'm gone...   
  
_ - and both made the same move at the same moment, lashing out with their claws rather than their guns. The two Zoids crashed into one another halfway through their jumps, practically coming to a dead stop in mid-air for all of a split second before Steven took the offensive, locking the Shield Liger`s jaw around the base of the Saber Tiger`s neck, then yanking the other Zoid straight down to the ground for a near body slam-type of move. Again, dust rippled from the impact point, and again, there was a pause.   
  
"_Give it up_," Steve ordered. The reply that met him was defiant and angry, in more ways than one.   
  
"I told you already," Leyon began, just as the Saber Tiger rose with a war cry, smacking the Shield Liger off guard in the chin and throwing the other Zoid into a backflip.   
  
"**_I CAN`T!_**"   
  
Leyon again pulled the trigger and the dual pulse cannons in the sides of the Blue Tiger flipped into view once more, just as Steven flipped his own heavy weaponry out of it`s place atop the Red Liger`s back.   
  
"_**THEN I`LL MAKE YOU!**_"   
  
_ When your education x-ray   
Can not see under my skin  
I won't tell you a damn thing   
That I could not tell my friends  
  
_** [**_"It`s not his fault!" Oscar yelled as an irate, tearful Leyon stormed for his Zoid. "I`m the one who wr-" "****__SHUT UP! AND WHILE YOU`RE AT IT, TELL THAT BACK STABBING SON OF A BITCH I QUIT!!!__"_**]**   
  
_ Roaming through this darkness  
I'm alive but I'm alone  
  
_ ** [**_"Leyon?" A severely burnt Rina Tauros asked, her voice as raspy as someone with throat cancer. Despite that, the ring to it still stirred the former Blitz Team member right out of his light rest, and his hand tightened reflexively around her own. "I`m here."   
  
"I don`t think I`ll make it..."   
  
"It`s okay, I`m right here. To the end," Leyon stated darkly, scooting forward and placing his other hand around the one he was already holding. Steven wasn`t in the room, the two had drawn straws since neither was really able to stomach the sight of the woman who had captured both of their hearts, not in her current state anyway. He was sitting outside, with Oscar, Maria and he and Rina`s son and one year old daughter.   
  
"Thanks... You`ve always been there for me, haven`t you?" Rina asked between a pair of hacking coughs, almost stirring Leyon to call a nurse out of concern for her. In answer though, he just nodded lightly, giving an affirming squeeze since he doubted she could see him given how much damage could have been done to her sight. "Steven`s outside with... Leon and Leena. We drew straws since neither of us were really up to seeing you like this an-" "You don`t. Need to explain it," she cut him off with a small sigh. "It`d be the same either way..."   
  
"What do you mean?" He asked cautiously. Rina gave a small, very resigned sigh, raspily breathing one of her last.   
  
"I love both of you, Leyon. I always have and I always will."   
  
And with that, Rina Fleiheit-Tauros died. Leyon felt the life seep out of her comparitively frail, badly burnt form, and the experience was one that would mar him to the end of his days._**]**  
  
_ Part of me is fighting this  
But part of me is gone  
  
_ Six explosions rocked the crater, causing the enormous cage that domed over it to rumble about ever so slightly from the sheer force of the blasts. Steven`s aptly dubbed Impulse Shockwave Cannons were more than an even match for the Ion Pulse Guns that Leyon had designed, and the combined effects of all six shots going off at once had been enough to rattle just about everything within the space of a an eighth of a mile around the crater-turned-warzone.   
  
Brutally again, the two Zoids met, clashing violently and rapidly as claws and fangs flew, but the mentality of the pilots went beyond mere combat. This was a battle of spirit against spirit, fate against fate and spite against pity. Again, the Red Shield Liger buckled, Leyon took the offensive but Steven was a split second faster, yanking the raker-styled controls into the proper pattern and allowing the Blue Saber Tiger to smash head first into his energy shield, flinging the other Zoid straight back into the air.   
  
Leyon recovered with a back flip, landing with a four-round procession of thuds on the hard packed dirt of the crater, squeezing the trigger again and unleashing a blitzkrieg of hellfire from the triple impact cannon on the Tiger`s chest. All of the rounds hit the shield, vaporizing instantly in puffs of super charged static and smoke - Leyon`s technical prowess struck again, the effect was that the shield cut out instantly for a split second.   
  
Steven had to react at a blinding pace, side-flipping the Liger out of the way of another four pulse cannon shots, then repeating the dodge into the opposite direction as Leyon let loose with another beam of energy from the Tiger`s fanged mouth.   
  
It was a vicious battle, no quarter asked, none given, and only one victor could emerge.   
  
_ So hold me when I'm here  
Right me when I'm wrong  
Hold me when I'm scared  
And love me when I'm gone  
  
_ **[**_Slowly, in dejected fashion, the door into the hospital room swung open and Leyon Martin stepped out, eyes clenched shut, face held nearly taut in an expression of pain that said his words for him. Steven, who sat nearby with his outright traumatized son, Leon, sitting beside him, instantly broke down. Maria, who held the snoozing Leena also came close to the edge of tears, and Oscar was gravely silent. Leon had been the first to arrive after the accident had happened, the boy was probably going to be effected for the rest of his life. Everyone else had pieced things together as it was - the constant bickering between Steve and Leyon had meant that neighter thought to fix the only automobile owned by the entire Blitz Team, and Oscar wasn`t fit to handle such a thing.   
  
The result?   
  
A look into the waiting room showed the result clearly enough.   
  
Sorrowfully, Leyon walked away. He said nothing, he made no motion or acknowledgement of anyone and instead just walked away, halting a few dozen steps down. The sound of a hospital wall giving to the force of a solid punch gave off a few seconds later, and Leyon continued on his way, leaving behind a visible hole in the side of the hallway. It would be a long time before he even spoke to anyone, and it would be a longer time before the Tauros family pulled themselves back together._**]**  
  
_ Everything I am  
And everything in me  
Wants to be the one  
You wanted me to be  
  
_ "Leon?"   
  
"What?"   
  
"You`re really starting to worry me here..." Naomi stated with actual, visible concern. Mark and Kyle had left by now, but the other two were still lingering around, if only because the original Red Comet was too concerned to really do anything other than stare at her zoned out team mate. Whatever was wrong with Leon, it had to be very bad to keep him focused on it for _this_ long.   
  
"What`s wrong?" She asked, a frank expression showing on her normally placid, laid back face. "... Nothing," Leon replied, still staring off in the distance. "Bullshit, Leon. Your attention span for problems isn`t long enough to keep out of touch with reality _this_ long unless something is _very_ wrong. Now _tell me_," she demanded hotly, brows furrowed with annoyance and concern, perhaps a hint of betrayal given that the two were literally so close that neither really kept anything from the other. Heck, they`d both seen each other nude more than a few times, and that was simply because they were as comfortable as they were around each other.   
  
The end result was that Naomi didn`t like feeling as though Leon was hiding a secret from her. It wasn`t a romantic relationship, but it wasn`t an ordinary friendship either. There were literally no secrets between them, at least none she knew of.   
  
"I don`t know, alright?" Leon grumbled out after a brief delay. "Just feels like something is wrong and I can`t tell what."   
  
"Does it have to do with the fact that you`ve been staring out at the desert for close to fifteen minutes without blinking more than four times?" Naomi snorted. "... You`re right. It does," Leon replied with a blink.   
  
Naomi didn`t even get the chance to question him further, Leon was already turning back and breaking into a sprint for the Red Blade Liger, and by the time she had even gotten the words out of her mouth, he was already climbing inside.   
  
"Leon! Wait up!"   
  
"I`ll meet you back in Farentown!" Leon yelled out, just as the Zoid`s cockpit slid shut. With a roar of both boosters and the Liger`s own vocals alike, the large, crimson Zoid was already zooming away at full speed. Naomi was left alone to blink for several seconds and then seethe a bit.   
  
_ "Men,"_ she finally thought with a baleful shake of the head, climbing into her Gustav and driving off after Leon at the transport Zoid`s full speed.   
  
_ I'll never let you down  
Even if I could   
  
"Something is going down out there,"_ Leon began, feeling it all nagging at the very edge of his senses. The Red Blade gained a quick burst of speed as it`s pilot`s thought was unwittingly finished out by someone else.   
  
_ I'd give up everything  
If only for your good  
  
"And I`m gonna find out,"_ Leena Tauros stated to herself in thought, ruthlessly commandeering a jeep since her Gunsniper was weighted down by all of it`s modifications. A twist of the key and the small vehicle took off into the desert, in the same direction as the one her older brother was headed in, much to the curiosity of Brad Hunter, who was still standing in the hangar, and still listening to Bit and Bill argue about the sandwhich that had earlier been smathered across the side of his face.   
  
It was probably the first time in a week or more that Leena had gone outside to begin with. The air might do her some good after all.   
  
Brad shrugged and looked back at the Scout Fox, just as suspiciously as ever.   
  
_ So hold me when I'm here  
Right me when I'm wrong  
You can hold me when I'm scared  
You won't always be there  
So love me when I'm gone  
  
_ In vicious fashion, chunks of the crater walls kept outright vaporizing, the very molecules that held the dirt together ripping apart from one another for seconds on end before clouds could even emerge as a result of each impact, and for every pulse of anti-gravity, another four bursts of plasma and three individual shots from a triple impact cannon. All of them missed, and for every shot from them, the Red Shield retaliated with two bolts from it`s impulse cannons, three shots from it`s triple impact cannon and two sustained beams from the double laser gun hidden in the Zoid`s back. All of them missed as well.   
  
There was a hard crash and the Shield Liger faltered back amid a shower of sparks, landing with a thud on the crater`s gently angled wall, rolling down briefly before making it back to it`s feet. Steven was breathless, Leyon was as well. For close to twenty minutes now, the two had been exchanging gunshots and claw swipes, but neither had spoken much of a word during the furious, almost unending exchange of attacks and defenses, parries and dodges.   
  
That would change now.   
  
"Not as rusty as I thought I was," Steven commented with a dry swallow. Leyon mirthlessly smirked from within the cockpit of the Blue Saber Tiger. "We`ve both been better," he exclaimed reluctantly. "But enough with talking, I want this over with."   
  
"You`re never going to stop and call it quits without this ending, are you?" Steven asked after a several second long lull.   
  
_ Maybe I'm just blind...   
  
_ "_Never_."   
  
** [**_"Hello there, Tauros," Leyon exclaimed proudly, leering down at the trashed Zoids on the battlefield. Even the Judge was down. Class D wasn`t a familiar place for either of the former Warriors, but since Leon was still a considerable rookie, Leena was just getting her feet for Zoid combat and the mercenary named Brad wasn`t exactly at the top of his game either, it was all they could manage. It was, at least, a good step up from Class E.   
  
"Leyon?" Steve asked in surprise and anger at the sight of his team, the Judge **and** the opposing team all leveled in a matter of seconds by the EMP missiles of the passing Whale King. "Who else?"   
  
"What do you want?" Steven asked darkly.   
  
"Revenge. Consider this open season, Tauros."   
  
It had been one of the countless battles between the two, but it had also been one of the most foreboding as well._**] **  
  
_ So hold me when I'm here  
Right me when I'm wrong  
Hold me when I'm scared  
And love me when I'm gone  
  
"Faster,"_ Leon thought in a rush, pushing the throttle forward to it`s absolute limits, then thumbing the booster hard enough that it almost became stuck at full power. Again, the Red Blade Liger responded in kind, bursting forward like a cheetah and tirelessly blasting by the nearby Blitz Team base, much to the curiosity of those who were still assembled in the hangar. Seeing the red streak didn`t mean they could identify it, but it was still quite a surprise given how relatively peaceful things were most of the time.   
  
_ Everything I am  
And everything in me  
Wants to be the one  
You wanted me to be  
  
_ It was another unintended coincidence that Leon`s actions came close to mirroring those of his sister. Leena wasn`t the best driver, she`d probably flunked the test to get a permit two or three times before ever succeeding, but she was still competent enough to handle a four wheel drive vehicle in the middle of the open desert at full speed. Planting the petal almost through the flooring of the vehicle wasn`t the smoothest thing to do - especially since that type of action put a lot more wear and tear on it than would happen otherwise - but given the strange feeling bugging at the edge of Leena`s senses, she could`ve honestly cared less about the condition of the jeep by the time she finished with it.   
  
_ Something_ was going on, and moving at just over a hundred miles an hour, Leena was intent on finding out just what in the hell it was.   
  
_ I'll never let you down  
Even if I could   
I'd give up everything  
If only for your good  
  
_ And far behind both of them, at full speed, came the Gustav. With nearly the same top speed as the jeep that Leena had commandeered, it was still getting outpaced badly by the Blade Liger but it was also still making relatively good timing.   
  
As for Naomi`s own thoughts on the matter?   
  
_ "I`m gonna jerk a knot in his ass if he doesn`t tell me what this is about when I see him,"_ she grumbled in thought, brows still furrowed into a very serious frown. With a quiet rumble, the Gustav continued trucking along at full speed, heading for the same battle that was still raging on within a crater within a valley in the desert, hundreds of miles away.   
  
_ So hold me when I'm here  
Right me when I'm wrong  
You can hold me when I'm scared  
You won't always be there  
So love me when I'm gone  
  
_** [**_"You wanted to settle this?"   
  
"Yes. This has gone on long enough, it`s time to end our little game. Once and for all."   
  
"How?"   
  
"A Zoid battle. Your Shield Liger versus my Saber Tiger, best equipment we can find on both."   
  
"Winner take all?"   
  
"No. No money, no Zoid ownership. No. Way. Out."   
  
"0927?"   
  
"Exactly."_**]**_   
  
Love me when I'm gone...   
  
_ In the middle of a crater situated in the middle of a valley located in the middle of a desert, two men and two Zoids fought each other. Morality was out the window, friendship once tighter than brothers went with it. Ethics and mercy meant nothing, there was no surrender, no retreat. The cause they fought for was as deeply personal as any other excuse men had ever used to fight one another, perhaps even more so than a good many of them. It was also a battle as intense as any that had raged across Zi during it`s conflict-prone history.   
  
It was a battle that knew few bounds, and even lesser limitations.   
  
It was a battle for the heart of a woman dead for close to fifteen years, and a battle over revenge that held little true logic to it.   
  
The Shield Liger took the offensive once more, crashing into the battle weary Saber Tiger with a colossal hail of fragmented debris - pulverized armor from both Zoids that had been struck away by the impact between them. Again, the Saber Tiger faltered back, and again, Steven charged forward, throwing up his shield and ramming Leyon head to head.   
  
The Saber Tiger again staggered away, never leaving it`s feet for an instant.   
  
"**_IT`S OVER, LEYON!_**"   
  
"**_NOT YET!_**"   
  
Steven made for another charge, but this time, Leyon was more than prepared for the attack, jumping straight up into a corkscrew of twists and turns and landing right behind the Red Shield. Steven cornered hard, running at an angle that defied the laws physics along the crater wall, continuing until he was springing along on the huge bars of the caged battleground, just as the machine gun turrets swung up into active.   
  
Sparks flew from thousands of missed impacts, and the Red Shield seemed to almost skid to a halt, completely upside down in the process. As soon as gravity had begun to take effect, Steve jumped his Zoid, twisting it upright in mid-air only to let out a scream of surprise when the Blue Saber struck out, lunging through the air and outright tackling the slightly larger Zoid from the air.   
  
A loud impact -   
  
_ Love me when I'm gone   
  
_** [**_"I love you both Leyon."_**]**   
  
_ When I'm gone  
  
_ - and the Shield Liger slammed into the ground with a roll, flinging the Saber Tiger up into the air and springing back to it`s feet -   
  
_ When I'm gone   
  
_** [**_"I always have and I always will."_**]**  
  
_ When I'm gone...   
  
_ - only for the Liger`s back to vaporize at an instant from an anti-gravity pulse, followed by it`s hind end. A loud screech of an almost dying Zoid and Steven yanked on the ejection lever, causing the cockpit to blow open, his chair bursting up like a phoenix from within, powered into the air by a lone single stage booster, which dropped away after less than a second. In the process of this, Leyon, irate as ever, neglected to realize the enormous electrical surge running through the bars of the cage as the Tiger came ever closer, finally landing on one of the huge bars at an angle and...   
  
"**_I`M NOT DONE WITH YOU!!!_**"   
  
The cockpit lit up like a Christmas Tree, but Leyon absolutely refused to quit, smashing through the small covering over the ejector button and causing the electrified cockpit of the Saber Tiger to blow open just like that of the Liger.   
  
With a burst of his own single stage rocket-powered ejector seat, Leyon Martin went flying forward at an angle, heading straight at Steven Tauros. Leyon was still in his ejector seat, Steve had just popped open his low altitude parachute, and the collision between the two was both violent and ugly, with Steven almost outright impaled on Leyon`s shoulder, his parachute yanking the two into an even uglier crash landing along the side of the crater wall, with Leyon taking the brunt of it upside down in his flight chair, the padding being the only thing that saved he and Tauros both from serious injury or death.   
  
For a second, they hung like that, both men gasping for air, and then they tumbled loose. Leyon rolled down, springing out of his chair halfway and launching himself into the wall, Steven sliding along into him with what looked like a dropkick into either shoulder. Rapidly, the two continued down before coming to a stop at the edge of the flat portion of the crater floor, both lying there.   
  
"This," Steven began between ragged breaths, not yet able to budge an inch. For all intents and purposes, Leyon was the same, Steven`s booted feet still planted firmly into his shoulders, lying on his face in the dirt.   
  
"Is absolutely insane," Tauros managed to finish after getting his breath. "Then give up," Leyon ordered exhaustedly, slowly coming up to his hands and knees and then rolling away onto his back. Neither man could move, both were just having to lay there and get their breath and strength back after one of the most intense battles that history would never record, yet that had only been half of the battle.   
  
After almost twenty more minutes of lying there, saying and doing nothing, the two worn down scientists slowly rose back up with the resilience and determination - and sheer spite - of warriors not seen on Zi in centuries. Both stood with their arms hanging, their postures mirroring each other, their expressions the same, even their breathing was in the same pattern.   
  
With loud, matching yells, both men charged at each other, ragged steps turning into exhausted sprinting strides. They met halfways, and Leyon`s size came into play as Steven jump, yanking his body backwards at the same time as he planted his feet into the heavier man`s stomach, flipping Leyon right through the air. Both skidded along to a stop over the course of a foot from where each landed, and they were back up at the same time, driving together and locking hands in a power struggle like few others.   
  
The Zoid battle had ended, but the duel of fates had just begun.   
  
Leyon took the initiative first, using his weight and the leverage that came with it to fling Steve right off his feet in a near judo-like fashion, though there was nothing pretty about the move. Neither of the two knew more than a basic style of hand-to-hand combat favored by the militaries of the Guylos and Helic nations, and it wasn`t a flashy technique. That aside, they only knew how to brawl, and contrary to popular belief, Steven Tauros and Leyon Martin(along with Oscar Hameros) had been in more than a few bar room brawls over the years.   
  
Steven rolled back to his feet though, not terribly quickly or with much agility since he, like Leyon, was still completely winded from the earlier crash landing on the crater wall. Even then though, the two continued fighting, with Leyon barreling forward as quickly as he could, then literally plowing through Steven with a shoulder into the chest. Both men toppled over, with Tauros taking the majority of the impact and Leyon rolling away on his shoulders from his own momentum.   
  
Again though, they were back up, and just like before, Leyon charged in, but Steve was ready for him this time, ducked under the former football player`s fists and grabbing him by the legs. Once that was done, all he had to do was stand up straight and throw the larger man right back down to the ground, continuing the attack with a jump and an elbow into the side of the neck. Leyon gave a hacking sputter afterward, but he was back up once more at the same time as Tauros, grabbing the lighter of the two combatants by one arm and outright throwing him straight up into the air -   
  
"**_SHE WAS SUPPOSED TO LOVE ME!_**"   
  
- then yanking him back down by the same arm, slamming Steven into the ground with what sounded like a soundful crack of the younger man`s lower back.   
  
"Take it up with Oscar, I only messed up by not telling him who it was supposed to be from," Steven replied after several seconds, pain echoing through in his voice. Leyon kept his grip though, yanking the other right back to his knees and then decking him flat out across the face. With a spurt of blood from a busted cheek, Steven toppled over onto his side and stayed there.   
  
"I don`t care," Leyon growled, taking the time to gather his strength back.   
  
"Crazy, pointy headed bastard," Steve muttered, coming up on hands and knees and then making it slowly back to his feet, though his back was noticably stiff.   
  
"Better to be insane and pointy headed than to play with toys," Leyon shot back, straightening up. Steven twitched.   
  
"Better to play with _toys_ than to have a Ramen noodle fetish!" He yelled, straightening up in kind.   
  
The next exchange again saw no words, Leyon started the attack and Steve sidestepped, letting loose with a swift kick into the back of the heavier man`s legs in mid-stride, then as Martin fell back, the younger scientist flatly smashed him across the cheek with a backhand, furthering the older man`s fall before toppling over backwards as well.   
  
Now they were both bleeding, from places on the cheek that made their facial wounds look like mirrors of each other. For several seconds, neither did anything other than lay there, but then, Steven sprang forward, just as Leyon threw a punch at random, catching the other completely offguard with a shot into the bottom of the jaw. Steven`s entire skull rattled, it was a wonder none of his teeth flew out, but the result was that his head flew back, followed by the rest of him. He landed with a sickening roll backwards, right onto his stomach.   
  
Leyon was the only one to get up this time, grinning like the absolute maniac that he was as Tauros pried himself back off the ground with an exhausted wheeze or two. Only one of them stood straight now, and that was the older, heavier of the two. Steven was practically on dream street, his vision was somewhat blurred and his head was throbbing, but that didn`t matter.   
  
This time, the younger of the two made the attack, literally throwing all of his weight into a single punch that Leyon barely ducked under. The heavier man grabbed the lighter around the waist in a bearhug, and then it was all over as Leyon put every ounce of pressure he could on the small of Steven`s back, heaving the lighter of the two off of his feet and stumbling around as he did so.   
  
"**_I GIVE UP!_**"   
  
** "Battle over! Battle over! The winner is... Leyon Martin!"   
  
** A dry thud, a delirious laugh and then a second thud followed by a second delirious laugh a few minutes later. Steven lay on his back, Leyon on his side, seperated by about a two feet, laying with their feet nearest each other. Both of them were laughing.   
  
Both of them were laughing.   
  
Both of them were _laughing.   
  


End Chapter Twenty-Seven  
  


_

* * *

  
  
**Author`s Note:** Those two may be old but they can still throw the hell down with the best of them, huh? x_X; And on a sidenote: Expect this to be one of(if not) the only true songfic chapter in the entire story of NA. When I`m Gone just happened to suit the whole feel of what I was going for so...  
  
And yes, it **was** intentional to make Rina`s last name Fleiheit. And yes, that does make Bit distantly related to Leena and Leon. It will probably be explained in depth later on, but for a bit of a starter on it: Van wasn`t an only child, remember? There was also Maria *Snicker.*  
  
**Zinou:** *Gets out the branding iron with "KFG" on it, aka Kale Fan Girl.* :P And yeah, the whole interaction between the Blitz and Thunder Teams was pretty fun to write. I had been wanting to have Zeke, Borealis, Bit and Bill all meet for a good while, so it made for a nice bit of comedy relief to have them bludgeon the snot out of each other over a sandwhich... Which wound up splattered on Brad`s face >_>; *Quickly puts the remains of said-sandwhich up for auction.* The scene with Stoller and Vega was actually meant to flesh them both out... Vega`s matured a bit too rapidly for his own good, Stoller is still very obscure but consider that the first bit of a look into the character dynamic of those two.  
  
And as for the heavens weeping... Meh heh heh hehhhh... *Twitch.* And also: I rather prefer one I ripped off the Warhammer 40kers, namely "**REPENT, FOR TOMORROW YOU DIE!!!**" Just has a nice, subtle ring to it, yanno?  
  
**EndlessAdventure:** Mark and Kyle`ve had their major shining moment for the time being. They`ll keep showing up whenever I can cram them in(there are still a few scenes I have in store for them, after all...), but that was basically their main starring part/s. And yes, I rather enjoyed them half asleep and mildly insane, but ah well... Least they`re still bitching, bickering and ripping each other to shreds, yes? As for Leena... I`ve been needing to flesh out the damage that Kale inflicted on her pretty badly. Really, she`s been hospitalized for most of the story so far so it`s time for some character development.  
  
Mark and Brad may or may not have their duel anymore. I`m not sure if and when it`ll happen, and Brad isn`t being Fox-sick because he misses the Shadow Fox. It`s another thing you`ll have to wait to see fleshed out :P I got the name 'Kale' from a character in a Dragoness Eclectic story(Mythic Descent and then Yamcha`s Student, both good stuff), later it evolved into Kalan(which has a story of it`s own) and then switched back to Kale around the time of Just A Kid.  
  
In case ya didn`t figure it out: Leyon won. Bet you were expecting Tauros to pull one out of his ass, huh? As for the Geno Breaker... Technically thats out of the question. The Fury **is** the next evolution up from the Breaker in NA, which means Shadow and Kale have something else up their sleeves. Leena will pilot a Zoid, yes.  
  
**Rhade:** Glad someone agrees about the defeat... Even the Blitz Team took a loss in the original series, same with the CC/GF cast. It was also to prove a point that Kyle and Mark still have a long way to go before they realize their 'potential.' *Hears Zinou snickering in the background.* ... >_>; Don`t mind her. And yes, action tends to get shoved aside in most romance fics. Hell, most of the characters tend to get shoved aside in romance fics too, but thats beside the point.  
  
Hopefully this one blew the lot of you all away. By and far, I`ve always felt that the triangle between Leyon, Steven and Leon and Leena`s mother was always one of the few things that the series(and every single god damn fanfiction around) neglected. As such, **someone** had to give the lot of them some spotlight, and this is that moment. And hopefully you could sense some real emotion in the flashbacks(which were bracketed and italicized) rather than overdone dramatics... Was one of the few times I`ve tried to pull off a romantic tragedy so...  
  
*Shrugs.* Enough rambling from me. Enjoy, leave a review, Sh33p out and see ya next time!  
  



	29. Renegade Mad Scientist Powwow

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I don`t own Zoids.  
  


* * *

  
  


**New Age**  
Renegade Mad Scientist Powwow   
  
  
  


A crater in the middle of the Kairan Valley, within a remote part of the desert a few hundred miles from Farentown, and with it, the Blitz Team base. The crater was enclosed by an enormous cage, which currently sat in complete shutdown mode. The Arena Judge stood limply, staring off into space like an immobile chess piece atop the huge structure, while the machine guns that had once so menacingly loomed on base of the cage sat in silence as well. Two downed Zoids lay strewn about, and a few small bloodstains stained the dirt. Further debris included a pair of trashed ejector seats and a shredded parachute that had literally been ripped off of the man who`d been wearing it.   
  
The source of the wreckage also happened to still be in the crater, namely two men in their mid-to-late 40s, currently seated dully on the forepaw of the downed Red Shield Liger, which looked far worse for wear than the equalled inactive Blue Saber Tiger. The difference was that the cockpit of the Shield Liger was still accessable, the head of the Saber Tiger had been essentially planted into the dirt and would require a few solid yanks from a Gustav to pry loose. Both Zoids wouldn`t be functioning for a while, either.   
  
Both men bore matching, scabbed up cuts and scrapes across their opposite cheeks, and if they`d glanced each other`s way, eye to eye, the wounds would`ve mirrored each other perfectly. Both wore their old piloting outfits, and both were sipping what looked like a mixture of alchohol and coffee out of a pair of thermal plastic mugs.   
  
"You still haven`t told me what it is you wanted to talk about after the battle," Steven pointed out, a hand on his back very obviously showing that he was still feeling a very major sting of pain from the earlier beating he`d taken. Leyon was calmer for once, though he was infrequently scratching at the scab that had formed on his cheek. There was another long pause and Steve took a sip from his cup.   
  
"The shit`s about to hit the fan," Leyon exclaimed, pausing again to take a sip of his own. Steve quirked a brow. "What do you mean?" He asked, leaning forward slightly and propping his upper body up with his elbows on his knees.   
  
"Just that. The shit`s about to hit the fan, Steven. The Golden Age isn`t gonna be golden much longer."   
  
"You still haven`t answered the question with any actual detail, Leyon," the younger scientist pointed out with a monotone voice. Leyon nodded to himself and sighed.   
  
"I take it you remember at least bits and pieces about the Ancient Zoidians, right?" Leyon asked, staring straight ahead with one of those looks that Steven had oftentimes found himself trying to imitate during their younger years.   
  
"Yeah, I remember the classes and the archaelogy trips we took back at the Academy. What about them?" He asked in reply, still watching Leyon`s movements with a certain wariness out of the corner of his eye.   
  
"Remember the old Principal of Balance theory we came up with then?" He asked.   
  
"For every single force in the universe, there is an equal opposite, a counterbalance to whatever it`s equally opposite of. For men, it`s women, for purely organic life, the techno-organic Zoids, for the natural, the unnatural, for life, death and for good, evil," Steve quoted the opening line of the old theory the two had come up with during their days as some of the sharpest minds ever to graduate the famed Schubaltz Phabes Zoid Academy, one of the most prominent learning centers for Zoid sciences and piloting on all of Zi.   
  
"Exactly. I recently extended the theory a bit."   
  
"What do you mean?"   
  
"Take a look around, Steve. On your team, you have a young man with Zoidian blood, Bit Cloud. To counterbalance him is another young man with Zoidian blood, Kale Obscura, and to force them both into balance is a boy by the name of Vega Obscura, also with Zoidian blood. Go back down the line and you have the balance between Fiona Alysse Linette and Van Fleiheit, and Raven and Riese."   
  
"... You just lost me," Steven muttered. "How can we even tell any of them have ancient Zoidian blood running in them? Let alone any relation Bit has to Van Fleiheit..."   
  
"Simple. Go by numbers. All things divide to three, a balance, a counterbalance and a force that either holds them in check or knocks them out of proportion. I`ve been doing some research on all of it and come across a good many things, like Zoid Eve," Leyon stated grimly. "Zoid Eve?" Steven asked.   
  
"Zoid Eve is the theoretical mother of all Zoids. The embodiment of a blend between the organic and the inorganic, life, birth, peace and prosperity. From what I`ve managed to dig up after hacking my way through old historical files, she was proven to exist around the time of the Death Stinger," Leyon began, going into the long winded explanation after a deep breath. "But the Death Stinger was only half of what really happened. There was a god damn cover-up back then, Steven. A big one, too. The Helic Republic had a lot to gain by making itself look like the ones who truly stopped the Death Saurer, and even more by making the claim that it was their technology - the Ultrasaurus and in a lie, the Gravity Cannon - that annihilated the Death Stinger."   
  
A pause for another breath.   
  
"In truth, this was just half the deception. The Guylos Emperor after Rudolph the Third, namely Rudolph the Fourth, had a vested interest of national pride. With the Helic Republic trying to show their own greatness, Rudolph the Fourth revived his nation`s prideful ways and blew things even more out of proportion, eliminating most of the records of the events that really destroyed the Death Stinger and the Death Saurer, but that wasn`t it."   
  
"Hm?"   
  
"Do you remember the Valley of the Rare Hertz?"   
  
"How could I forget? Half of my theories on Zoid psychology come from when we went there..."   
  
"The Valley of the Rare Hertz is the gateway leading into a city of the Ancient Zoidians. A big one. I don`t know it`s name but if I`m right about Zoid Eve, the city is prosperous, peaceful and unnatural. It`s also situated in the center of the Rare Hertz anomoly, discount the Rare Hertz and -"   
  
"And the valley is one of the most hospitable places on Zi. A cool desert sitting near a large river of some of the purest water around, with soil rich enough to sustain just about anything," Steven interrupted. "Which means if you`re thinking what I think you`re thinking..."   
  
"Nothing is moving in the Valley of the Rare Hertz. Everything is moving on the Dark Continent of Nyx," Leyon finished the sentence in roundabout fashion, a dark expression lining it`s way onto the faces of both men. "There was a second Death Saurer, as well, Steven. The true Death Saurer. From what I`ve dug up of historical conspiracies, it was powerful and large enough to literally eat the Death Stinger if it wanted, it`s power put the Geno Breaker to outright shame and it was able to withstand the Gravity Cannon like it wasn`t even phased. If you look hard enough, you can _still_ find traces of the times it fired it`s ultimate cannon and annihilated cities across the planet."   
  
"... I see. But we incorrectly attributed that to the Death Stinger`s brief stay in orbit..."   
  
"Exactly. One destructive tyrant conceals the actions of the next if you spin it right," Leyon exclaimed knowingly. The two men weren`t scientists for nothing, after all. "The Death Saurer was in that ancient city in the valley. As was Zoid Eve. From what little I`ve scrounged up of the remains of Phabes` work, the Death Saurer was originally created to stop warrior Zoids. It went berserk though."   
  
"... And ended up destroying the Zoidians."   
  
"Exactly. And it had to be made that powerful to stop something -"   
  
"Even worse."   
  
"Precisely. What doesn`t make sense is that there should be a third force involved in this. The wild card factor, and that happens to be a theoretical Guardian," Leyon explained. "A Guardian?"   
  
"Someone who either keeps balance going or disrupts it completely. So far we see the disrupting factor coming into play as Kale Obscura, but Bit Cloud and Vega aren`t balancers. The natural extension of this chain of logic means there`s another out there, either a pure Zoidian or a pure human. A Guardian."   
  
"You`ve put a lot of thought into this, haven`t you?" Steven asked grimly. "Yeah. It sounds crackpot, but so far..."   
  
"So far, it`s disturbingly standing up to everything I can think to throw at it."   
  
Further silence as both of the two middle aged scientists thought through the possibilities of what the theory implicated. If it was right, that would mean there was something insane coming, something dark beyond words and something that would rattle all of Zi to the core and beyond. The signs had started appearing, forces were changing, the balances had been struck and everything was coming together like a coffin slamming shut.   
  
Dark times were ahead, the two thought, but they only knew a fraction of the story.   
  
  
Still miles away in the middle of nowhere, a lone jeep rambled on at full speed, heading on the same bylining course as it had from the start of the driver`s journey to figure out what was so nagging at her senses. The jeep`s driver was named Leena Tauros, a battle scarred fifteen year old girl currently having an overkilled entree into the world of sudden angst and depression. The fact that she had become more than a _bit_ out of touch with reality because of this meant that she failed to notice the loud pairs of beating sounds coming from either side, in front and behind her small vehicle. She also failed to notice how a shadow suddenly loomed overhead and then -   
  
The Red Blade Liger roared.   
  
- she broke into a hard swerve, zinging between the huge war machines left legs and cornering hard to a dead stop while the Zoid slowed to a halt and doubled back.   
  
"**_WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU TRYING TO DO, LEON, KILL ME?!_**" Leena demanded in an irate flash of her old self, just as the Blade Liger cockpit slipped open, with a semi-dumbfounded looking Leon Tauros standing up inside.   
  
"Sorry, Leena! What are you doing out here, anyway?" He yelled out to his sister, who was still visibly upset. Leena paused though, calming with a few seconds and then answering the question with a small bit of reluctance, if only because it wasn`t exactly normal to be driving a jeep in a random direction at over a hundred miles an hour in the desert.   
  
Then again, it wasn`t normal for a person to be replicating that sort of thing inside of a Blade Liger either.   
  
"Felt something was funny... Was bugging the hell out of me, you?" She called back out. Leon nodded absently. "Same reason," he shouted back, plopping back down into the cockpit and putting the harness back on. "I`ll go up ahead," he said through the speaker unit. "See you at whatever we`re headed for..."   
  
"Right," Leena mumbled, quirking an eyebrow up. _"What the heck`s with him?"_ She thought, refering towards the fact that he never intentionally moved a large distance away from his younger sibling without making sure she was safe. Big brother complex and all that.   
  
Whatever it was, Leon didn`t stick around to give much of an answer, instead turning the Blade Liger back in the direction that Leena herself was being compelled in, then taking off at full speed once more. With a shake of the head and a rumble from the jeep`s engine, Leena followed suit at her best speed.   
  
  
** Pain... **_  
  
"Sucks, doesn`t it?" _  
  
I haven`t hurt this badly since Bonding.   
  
_ "Bonding?" _**  
  
Becoming one with this Zoid.   
  
__** "Oh. Sorry to hear that," Vega thought at Specular, still watching as the huge fried hulk of a Zoid was gradually lifted up off of the ground, slowly settling in between a pair of enormous magnetic panels, just as three or four dozen thin, spindly robotic arms extended out from the walls to either side, literally having to tear some armored panels off, while others merely broke away with ease. For the Storm Fury, a Zoid that had been so unstoppably quick and powerful, it was a highly ignoble condition it sat in. Disabled, Command and Combat systems completely offlined due to battle damage, sensors fried out of use, stabilizers shot to hell and back again twice over and even a nearly injured Zoid Core.   
  
It made Vega`s skin crawl.   
  
** At least I`m concious now, right?   
  
**_ "Double edged sword."   
  
_** Hm? **_  
  
"You can talk but you`re still hurting."   
  
_ Fury was silent at that, and Vega - who was seated idly on the floor, still in his battlesuit despite having been out of actual combat for close to a day straight now - was about the same. A quiet hum filled the enormous room shortly thereafter as four half rings extended on two gigantic arms from the walls behind the Fury, clamping into two rings around it in a gigantic circle-cross.   
  
Then there was more silence. And then another hum, different this time. Almost musical, but not quite. It was the hum of electricity, the hum of the two rings swishing about the Fury in opposite directions, one up and down, the other across with both rotating diagonally. The Zoid issued a low rumble, and Vega felt every hair on his body stand on end.   
  
** ... Ow.   
  
**_ "I guess it`s like peroxide. Helps but it still burns, huh?"   
  
_** Like Hell.   
  
** A low chuckle from the youth, though Specular indignantly found it quite the opposite. Fury rumbled again, and Vega almost openly laughed but stopped short just before he could.   
  
_ "You never told me what Shadow is,"_ Vega reminded her a bit sternly. If the Zoid could have moved, it probably would have shrugged indignantly and then sighed before giving the full story. Vega was persistent though, and his curiosity slowly coaxed Specular into admitting things that she probably rather disliked speaking about.   
  
** Shadow is... _Was_ the youngest Organoid among us, now another takes that designation. He was originally the bound partner of your forefather, Raven. The two were inseperable, even when Raven would`ve just as soon claimed that he would allow Shadow to die, or when Shadow seemingly betrayed him in the service of the Dark Kaiser. But...   
  
** A longer pause this time. Specular only continued at the emotional prodding of her young cohort.   
  
** But he, like all Organoids, is almost immortal. He cannot die with age, only combat or choice. Shadow fears death, but he only realized mortality when Raven died. It left him bitter, angry. When She and I and he set Raven`s body to rest in a cavern within Nyx, Shadow stayed behind. She set me free in the years to follow, and I took this with me to visit him once. I forgot how long ago it was, but it was long enough that in the darkness of the abyssal cavern, Shadow had become consumed by his own bitterness and anger. He hated mortality, he hated anything that could die because Raven could and did die. Raven left him behind...   
  
__** "Sounds like he could use some therapy..."   
  
** Shadow isn`t the only one. Van`s death had nearly the same effect on Zeke - the Liger Zero. He took that Zoid`s remains and fled into the desert, I didn`t see him again until we fought him the first time. Echoed though, when the Backdraft found me, but that`s another story for another time.   
  
**_ "Agreed."   
  
_** Shadow spent two hundred years growing, becoming more powerful. He had always been the most powerful amongst us, or at least the most potentially powerful. Ambient could defeat him during his youth but now I`m not so sure. The Zoid Magnite in the cavern, his hatred and betrayal, loneliness and utter isolation left him to do nothing but grow stronger - both in his powers and his hate. For much of that time, he Slept. And then...   
  
**_ "Kale and I woke him up."   
  
_** Yes. The anger your brother has is strong, Vega. Together, you amplify one another like a magnifying glass to a laser, what one feels, the other unwittingly broadcasts. Your desperation to protect Sarah heightened how you magnified his own rage, enough that Shadow felt it. And other things that move on Nyx. Kale is like Raven once was, you know?   
  
**_ "How so?"   
  
_** Indiscriminately murderous, single minded, destructive and vicious. Violent to the extreme and capable of backing it up, with the strength, skill and intelligence to defeat Organoids and Chosen alike. He`s also worse, because he`s inherited much from my own former bound partner. You`re foremother. Riese. **  
  
_ "I`m guessing that`s bad."   
  
_** Very. With time, he may fully access the same telepathic abilities she has. And the other abilities. The same ones you possess.   
  
** Silence followed again. Vega didn`t bother with asking what powers he might have possessed, if only because it just didn`t interest him at the moment. Neither spoke from there, and for a long while, the only sound - even in thought - was the sound of the dull electromagnetics stimulating the Fury into healing itself.   
  
  
"How did I let you talk me into this?" Leyon asked, trudging along glumly after the younger scientist.   
  
"Because you`re stupid?" Steve answered with a cheshire grin, though the older scientist couldn`t see it. It had taken them ten minutes to climb their way out of the crater, how long they`d been walking was anyone`s guess but both had run out of that potent mixture of coffee and alchohol by now so it had to have been at least twenty or thirty minutes since then.   
  
"Insane? Probably. Stupid? No," Leyon shot back, picking up his speed a small bit to where he was moving alongside Steven. The afternoon sun was pounding down on the two, the sands were thanklessly packed hard enough that their feet didn`t sink into the ground with every step, but it was still nothing that either man was going to be wanting to do again for a _very_ long time.   
  
"Don`t you mean 'obviously' and 'yes?'" Steve asked chidingly. The heat was starting to get to him as well.   
  
"... You`d think we could hold a sane conversation after all _that_, couldn`t we?" Leyon muttered, staring at his feet.   
  
"We`re both renegade mad scientists. Sanity is not something we`re capable of," Steve reminded with a shrug, both men continuing along without pause despite how they were verbally jabbing away at one another.   
  
For how much longer the two walked the way across the desert, neither knew, but eventually both came to a dead stop, standing half-slumped against each other`s sides. Both were tired, both were aching all over still(and Leyon`s electrical burns were finally starting to show) and both were on the edge of falling over as it was. They were only standing because Leyon was too heavy for Steven to knock over and Steven was leaned at too sharp an angle to Leyon to crush him.   
  
It was at about that time that Leyon noticed a red speck on the horizon. He shrugged it off though, and it got a bit bigger. Steven noticed it too, but he shrugged it off as well and it got bigger again. Both of them stared off in opposite directions, finally slipping down to the ground and leaning back-to-back in an exhausted fashion.   
  
"Always knew I`d die a highly ironic, stupid death..."   
  
"... Ah, shyaddap."   
  
Both broke into a light fit of delirious laughter, then shot straight to their feet as a loud roar filled the air, rattling both to the very core. That red speck hadn`t just gotten larger - it had turned into a full fledged red Blade Liger! And it was standing right in front of them.   
  
"... How the hell?" Both asked as the cockpit flipped open, revealing Leon Tauros as the young man stood up inside, staring down at the two mad scientists with an eyebrow soundlessly arched straight up into his forehead.   
  
"I could ask you two the same question," he stated blandly.   
  
  
"How is he?" A voice came from behind. Vega jolted slightly, but he didn`t move to see who it was. The voice was easily recognizable, mainly since the person happened to be someone he was vaguely familiar with even before he`d wound up having her on his mechanical support crew.   
  
"She, actually," he corrected as an afterthought, listening to the sound of a chair unfolding next to him before Katherine Takahori plopped down. "She?" The young woman asked. "She. The Organoid is a she, so the Zoid is a she, too," Vega answered rather plainly with a small shrug. "Ah... Weird."   
  
"Not really, animals have gender, Zoids might have at one time and Specular likes to think of herself as a she, so..." Another shrug. "I see," Katherine replied with a blank stare down at the boy, who was still sitting Indian-style on the floor, like he had been all day. "Don`t you need to eat? Sleep? Use the bathroom?"   
  
"Stigma put you up to t his, huh?" Vega asked, instantly recognizing the concerns as Stoller`s own.   
  
"You know that guy too well," the woman replied with a nonchalant tone. "But he`s right, you haven`t eaten, slept or used the bathroom in three days," she stated with a dry tone of voice. "I`ve gone on less before," Vega said with another shrug. "Maybe, but it isn`t healthy and you need to be healthy if you`re going to continue being a Zoid Warrior. Besides, doesn`t Specular want you to not die of malnutrition and sleep deprivation?"   
  
"Specular passed out again. The electricity stings almost as much as the actual damage.   
  
"Sorry to hear that..."   
  
"She`ll be okay," Vega stated. "Want me to bring you _something_ to eat? Maybe a sleeping bag?"   
  
"Food, sure. I need to keep on a reasonable sleep schedule though, and if I pass out now, I won`t be able to do that," Vega stated glumly, resting his head in one hand. "Then at least use the friggin` bathroom..."   
  
"Will in a little bit."   
  
"Bathe while you`re at it. I can smell you from here..."   
  
"Torson is enough of a whiny bitch, thank you very much," Vega cynically muttered, half under his breath. Kat glared at him a bit murderously but calmed as soon as she realized he was completely unphased.   
  
"Not too social, are you?"   
  
"Just go get the food if you think I need it so badly. I`m not going anywhere."   
  
With an uttering of several profane words under her breath, Katherine rose to her feet and wandered off to do just that, leaving the sleep, food and hygienically deprived Vega to sit and continue his wordless vigil for Specular and the Fury.   
  
  
That night, elsewhere and far away from the chaos that was setting itself up to break loose across the face of the planet, and across the collective face of a uniquely interconnected group of people, Marcus Harlock and Abigail Summers were aboard a Hammerhead flight bound for the Garamos Islands, just south of the equator. It was time for a vacation, a week long break from it all. The ZBC had granted a leave for both Mark and Kyle following their little Suicide Days venture, and while Kyle had decided to use the time doing whatever, Mark had agreed that it was time for he and his girlfriend to have a nice, _private_ trip away from battling.   
  
Abbie, though uneased at the prospect of traveling over the ocean in a Zoid, was conced out in the seat next to the aisle, but Mark was wide awake. Doing what he`d been doing since Abbie had fallen asleep.   
  
Tossing a coin three times in a row and calling it each time.   
  
_ "Heads."   
  
_ It landed. He looked.   
  
"Tails," he muttered for the umpteenth time. Another toss.   
  
_ "Tails."   
  
_ It landed. He looked.   
  
"Heads," he muttered with the same tone as before. Another toss.   
  
_ "Tails."   
  
_ It landed. He looked.   
  
"Tails," he nodded to himself. Two times out of three, he`d been wrong. It was rapidly dawning on him, as he made one final toss and flunked it again, that luck was no longer going to be on his side. If not in coin tossing, then probably not in anything else.   
  
Thoughtfully, Mark turned and glanced out at the sea beneath the Hammerhead. It seemed as though his luck had finally run out...   
  


_ End Chapter Twenty-Eight  
  
_

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**Author`s Note:** Sorry for this one being a bit shorter than usual, but after the marathons of the last few chapters, it was about time for a slower, calmer, shorter bit of story, yes? Besides, I think I revealed enough of the plot to everyone to make up for the lack of chapter length :P  
  
Also surprised so few people commented on the Leyon/Tauros battle, but oh well.  
  
**Zinou:** Already got to your comments via AIM >_>;  
  
**Vile21x:** The whole point of brutalizing Leena like that was to make people complain. If you`ll notice, most people who make her angsty tend to screw her character up either with rape, humiliation or the death of a family member or friend, and they **never** touch her appearance. Consider what I did a lead pipe upside the heads of people who do that.  
  
**EndlessAdventure:** *Cracked up when he first read that.* Someone actually got it XD *Doesn`t actually play WH40K, but knows a few who do, so...*  
  
**DJ Wolfwood:** Gave it quite a bit of thought actually, but decided against it. My plate`s full enough as it is right now, don`t really have the time/stamina to be a part of another group(already a member of the VALL thing), so sorry, thanks, but no thanks. Hope you enjoy the story though :P That`s all for now folks. Enjoy, leave a review, Sh33p out and see ya next time!  
  



	30. Broken Mirror Redux

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I do not own Zoids.  
  


* * *

  
  


**New Age**  
Broken Mirror Redux   
  
  
  


"I still can`t believe you accepted a challenge from them," Steve groaned out sulkily. "Bad enough they pummeled us into a near draw last time we fought them, now we`re so evenly matched not even Jamie busting out with the Wild Eagle is going to do any good," he whimpered with obvious annoyance. Jamie on the other hand, as he had been for most of the past week, was still brooding to himself without a word, not even saying a single thing to anyone aside from the occasional outbursts about his alter ego having a blue haired, tanned skin fetish of some sort.   
  
Leena on the other hand, was lazily gnawing on Bit`s skull while Brad was calmly sipping away on his usual mid-day cup of coffee. While dangling from the ceiling(the boards on the floor he`d been standing on had completely given out for some reason. One fall and an errantly placed pipe later, Brad was hanging upside down).   
  
A grown man was whimpering to himself, a teenaged girl was gnawing on someone`s skull without aforementioned skull gnawing victim even noticing, a teenaged boy was complaining about a secondary personality having a fetish for girls with blue hair and tanned skin and an apathetic coffee drinker was dangling upside down from the ceiling. Just another perfectly _normal day_ at Blitz Team HQ.   
  
"I still have issues to settle with greaseball."   
  
"Such as?"   
  
"Such as the fact that he _is_ a greaseball in the first place," Brad pointed out annoyedly. Bram Hunt was obviously the first person to ever get very far under Brad`s skin in a _very_ long time.   
  
"That`s hardly good reasoning, Brad," Bit pointed out, nonchalantly dumping his own cup of steaming hot coffee over his shoulder and into Leena`s hair. "**_OW!!!_**" He yelped immediately afterward. "I think she just cracked my freaking skull!"   
  
"... And on top of that, I`m surrounded by idiots..." Jamie grumbled to himself, rocking back and forth in a ball on the floor.   
  
  
Elsewhere of course, Vega Obscura sat as he had for close to two days now, a tray of what had been a pound`s worth of food sitting off to the side, an unused sleeping bag sitting to the opposite side. The Fury still hung as if suspended by cables and hooks that didn`t exist, held aloft within a magnetic field that was powerful enough to supercede gravity. He had yet to sleep, but at least he`d bathed, used the bathroom and eaten during the time the Fury had hung there, healing slowly but steadily from the insane amount of damage inflicted by Kale.   
  
A slight distance away though, stood one Katherine Takahori, who`d only slept about four hours during the past twenty-four or so that had gone by. She was visibly irritable, and not out of concern for the young pilot sitting indian-style in front of the service gear being used to restore his Zoid. She was irritable for another reason entirely: She hadn`t had a cigarette in ten hours. Like several others in the exceedingly tangled web that connected Vega Obscura, Bit Cloud, the Suicide, Thunder, Lightning, Blitz, Sabers and Fluegel Teams together, along with countless other individuals across the face of the planet who happened to be connected by the frayed ends of the web`s threads, Katherine was a smoker. Not just a casual smoker like Brad Hunter, or even an average smoker like Leyon Martin had once been, but a person with a two-pack-a-day habit.   
  
That meant she was used to having a cigarette at _least_ once an hour. Ten hours without a single smoke was enough to drive such a person to thoughts of homicide.   
  
Thankfully, her 'shift' of watching Vega had come to an end now, Torson was taking over for the time being since the three members of Vega`s crew had been tasked to watch after him for about ten hours each, working in shifts. Torson, thankfully for him, was both not a smoker, and not someone who came unprepared for boredom, as evidenced by the datapad-styled handheld computer in one hand, along with a small case of CDs that Kat could clearly identify as relating to either mechanics, history or Zoid psychology.   
  
"Have fun with King Chat," she muttered annoyedly, though Vega`s hearing was obviously far sharper than anyone was willing to give him credit for, even after the damage caused by his initial bout with his senior brother.   
  
"Social contact chafes me," he stated bluntly, shifting for the first time in three hours straight.   
  
Torson snickered, Kat twitched and the sound of a door slamming shut followed suit as the young woman exited the hangar in a mild frenzy. For his credit though, Torson wasn`t snickering at Vega`s comment.   
  
"Not too chatty, huh, _Vegie_?" The geeky mechanic asked with a grin two miles wide and twice as annoying as any expression that Bit Cloud could ever _hope_ to show off. For what it was worth, Vega just twitched around a bit and glared back at the man with a bullish snort. "Thought so," Torson commented while sitting down on the floor, leaned against the wall next to the doorframe and idly turning the handheld on without another word.   
  
Torson was a name that sounded oddly familiar to the boy, and had he thought to actually put any memory into it, he likely would`ve fallen over in shock that this Torson - Lars Torson - happened to be the older brother of the same Alfred Torson that had killed himself just a few months prior. Just another awkward connection in the undeniably tangled web of lives he was a part of without even knowing it.   
  
Outside though, Katherine would likely have lit up a smoke and complained while storming over to where her on-job-quarters(Stoller was a good employer, he tended to make sure there were individual bed-and-bathrooms for the people who worked for him, especially if they had a record for working long hours and not going home every night after finishing work) to go to sleep after taking a nice bath. As it stood though, she was halted from this process by a young, silver haired man wearing a grin that could blind someone in an instant, holding a very nice gift in one hand, with the other tucked into his side pocket.   
  
Said man was one Kyle Mazemia. Said gift was a bundle of some fifteen _very_ large, _white_ roses.   
  
"Told ya I`d be coming to see you," he said with a tone underlined in affectionate sarcasm.   
  
Almost on reflex, Kat dropped the cigarette she`d been about to light, and instead broke in a smile. It had easily been two months and well...   
  
Time flies when you`re in love, does it not?   
  
  
The battlefield was one that held a large tint of remembrance and familiarity to it as two gigantic non-Zoids, the HoverCargoes of the Blitz and Thunder Teams, pulled in at opposite sides in the same direction, turning ninety degrees to face one another from just over a mile apart. The first HoverCargo was a custom fitted model, the BlitzCargo as it was sometimes known. Blue and white, it could carry five Zoids on average, nine if the armor chambers of the Liger Zero were removed. It was also armed heavily with machine cannons. The second HoverCargo was also custom fitted, the ThunderCargo was what it was sometimes dubbed. Red and black, it could also carry five to nine Zoids, and it was also armed heavily with machine cannons.   
  
The two things were like mirror images of one another. Same function, same size, same armament, same armor, everything about them was the same except for their color schemes and the people who were within.   
  
"Mobilizing Spike Sniper!"   
  
"Mobilizing Gunsniper!"   
  
At once, two Zoids that were the epitomy of opposing use were launched. One was the heavily armed, heavily weighted down Wild Weasel Gunsniper used by Leena Tauros. It was her first Zoid battle in at least a month straight, possibly longer. Her Zoid was tailored for what was literally known as 'Spam Raiding,' which was a tactic of completely plastering an area in gunfire and then letting someone else pick up the pieces of any unfortunate sap of an enemy left standing.   
  
The other was the almost utilitarian Spike Sniper. It was armed with stabbing spikes instead of guns. Three of them took the place of fingers, all could be rotated just as if they were fingers. Three rows of rotating spikes on a significantly armored, semi-rigid tail ensured that the Zoid could stab an opponent in almost any location, while an additional three spikes jutted out from it`s head like horns, one from above and behind the cockpit, one from either side of the head. It`s only ranged armament seemed to be the gattling gun on it`s groin and the mortar launchers that were standard issue on any Gunsniper. Leena couldn`t tell if her counterpart - Laura Tendro - had kept the sniper rifle in place.   
  
"Mobilizing Command Wolf!"   
  
"Mobilizing Scout Fox!"   
  
Again, two more Zoids launched in unison, landing with skids next to their team mates. The Scout Fox was defiant, more than a little cranky and the Command Wolf had obviously not forgotten their previous duel either, as evidenced by the low growl it gave off. It almost looked as if Brad and Bram would kick the match off before the Judge even arrived, but to their mutual credit, they stuck with insulting one another at a distance.   
  
"I`m gonna wipe that grease out of your hair, lube up a golf club with it and shove it up your ass."   
  
"You _would_ know about shoving things up people`s asses, huh?"   
  
"Me? No, that`s _your_ field of expertise."   
  
"Mobilizing Liger Zero Schneider!"   
  
"Mobilizing Geno Saurer!"   
  
The final pair of combatants entered the fray without hesitation, and unlike the two before them, these two fought in Zoids that were almost nothing like one another. The first was the Schneider, orange, bladed and designed almost exclusively for fighting at point blank. The second was the Geno Saurer, a bluish Zoid designed to best it`s opponents mainly at ranged combat, though it could very obviously hold it`s own point blank. After it came a streak of blue -   
  
_ I was wondering if you`d have the guts to show up.   
  
** Can it, geezer. **  
  
Chibi!   
  
** AGH!   
  
**_ - and all the smart talk that went with it as Borealis merged into the tyrannid Zoid`s back in a luminous display of blue and red outlining a blackish-colored center, leaving the Geno Saurer to roar it`s war cry across the battlefield, only to be met by an equally loud cry from the Liger Zero.   
  
And then both Zoids` cries were shut out completely by the sound of the Judge Capsule slamming down with a furious sonic boom followed by the sounds of a robotic voice, eager to get things started.   
  
** "The area within a five mile radius is a designated Zoid Battlefield. This zone is now restricted to competitors and authorized personnel, all others must leave at once. Area scanned, battlefield set up. The Thunder Team versus the Blitz Team!"   
  
**_ "Let`s show that brown eyed sap why you don`t mess with **MY** sandwhich..."   
  
I`m much more concerned with the 'confused youngster,'_ Zeke replied, obviously hinting at a different kind of confusion than preference for a set colorscheme.   
  
"... Organoids can be like that?" Bit asked verbally in outright surprise. The Liger gave a sagely nod to itself, though Zeke was lying. The result was still the same either way: "Ew," Bit cringed. It was one thing for humans to be same sex oriented, but _Organoids_? Sheesh...   
  
_ "That`s kinda..."   
  
I was joking. Dimwit.   
  
"... Oh."   
  
****_ "Battle mode 0982. Ready..."   
  
Both teams began to split apart from cohesion, singling one another out, member by member. Bit and the Liger paired off with Bill and the Geno, Brad with Bram and Leena with Laura, moving apart until they were all spread out in a matter of seconds.   
  
** "_FIGHT!!!_"   
  
** In the background of a battle being waged a hundred miles away though, another battle was also waging as a Raynos, consipicuous in it`s absence from the Blitz Team`s HoverCargo, or base, touched down with a slow, almost methodical quality, landing in a slow set of strides on the edge of a cliff. The battle being waged was between an overworked conscience and an underworked secondary personality that had a massive complex when it came to dealing with guilt.   
  
Jamie Hameros had a naturally guilty conscience. The Wild Eagle couldn`t stand dealing with guilt even if he was paid to. The clash within that resulted was quite obvious.   
  
A moment passed as the cockpit flipped open, swinging up and being followed a quarter of a second later by the sound of Jamie`s safety harness swinging up and out of the way, followed by the sound of two sneakered feet smashing to the hard dirt beneath the Raynos` head. Hameros wasn`t alone though, nearby stood a single Zoid that was about the same size as the Liger Zero`s base armor, and the same color scheme as well. The key difference was that the Zoid was armed differently, in addition to being different in other ways.   
  
It was a Konig Wolf. A large, heavily armored, agile and quick Zoid based off the Wolf model, rare and ideal for long ranged sniping _or_ point blank combat. There was also another who happened to be standing next to it, significantly smaller, obvious human and obviously female. A slight regal stance was the first thing Jamie noticed, recognizing this as Leyla`s third, more mature personality: Eliza. Eliza happened to be the easiest to distinguish because her very posturing was straighter than the flirtatious one used by Connie, or the casual one favored by Leyla herself. Her hair seemed just a shade darker, her eyes seemed the same way.   
  
"How did the tests go?" She asked autonomously, maintaining a well mannered appearance even then. The mention of the tests he`d undergone to make sure he was uninfected by any of the sexually transmitted diseases that were recently getting national attention almost brought Jamie to wince, but he didn`t. The Wild Eagle outright screamed profanity though.   
  
"Right now, they think I`m gonna test negative for everything. Can`t be too sure `til the results come back though..."   
  
"Does anyone else know?"   
  
"_No_. I think Brad might have a clue since he`s practically a mind reader, but no. How about the tests on your end of things?"   
  
"Negative. I make sure to get Leyla tested once a month, and thankfully, Connie is usually too weakened to protest both of us at once," Eliza replied, reaching down and leaning against the ankle stabilizer of the Konig Wolf`s front left leg.   
  
"That`s a relief..."   
  
"Jamie," she cut off, ending whatever he was about to say in an instant. "I know that you have feelings for Leyla," she stated clearly. The young Hameros literally facefaulted. "And don`t bother denying it, I can and do read minds when I have to," she halted his retort in an instant once again. This time, he almost fell over. "But I cannot allow her to be compromised this early in life by a relationship. She isn`t ready for it, neither is Connie and her 'father' would likely try to kill you."   
  
"Compromise? All I wanna do is date her..."   
  
"Exactly. Her father is a genetics scientist, he can`t afford to have his only specimen compromised," Eliza answered with an air of what sounded vaguely akin to a mixture of impatience, annoyance and outright displeasure. There would be a long pause before either of Eliza or Jamie spoke again.   
  
  
In the same desert where Bit Cloud first defeated Stigma Stoller, and years before him, Bill Chapman defeated the same man in Stigma`s final official battle for four years, the Blitz and Thunder teams waged a battle like few others. On one end of the spectrum, the Command Wolf and the Scout Fox played the dangerous game of chicken-with-bullets, with each Zoid only barely dodging out of the way with every attack.   
  
On another, Leena Tauros and Laura Tendro played a dangerous game of their own, but it was also going to be the first game to end. Despite being rustier than a nail in someone`s coffin, Leena was near the top of her usual game, hopping back with every shot she took. Laura jumped forward with every dodge made, and after a matter of seconds, the two were at point blank. Leena was quicker, but Laura had dumb luck and pure equality on her side, launching her pick-like hands forward just as Leena opened up with every gun in her arsenal.   
  
** "Leena Tauros and Laura Tendro are out of the battle!"   
  
** Both Zoids fell sideways at the same time. Leena had managed to vape the armor of the Spike Sniper with enough force to knock out the command system, while Laura had made her attacks with enough speed to stab into the Gunsniper`s throat with her right thumb-spike, severing the Zoid`s equivelent of a jugular and a spine. It had ended in a draw that helped neither Laura`s ego, nor Leena`s ever wavering confidence.   
  
As one game ended, another was kicking into high gear. Despite being mismatched by range, Bill, Bit and their Zoids were going at it blow for blow, with every shot causing minor damage on both sides.   
  
"**_BUSTER SLASH!_**"   
  
A brutal clash of silver-blue against silver-white.   
  
The Liger touched down with a swaggering skid, and behind it, the Geno Saurer roared with indignance, a fresh, smoking cut trailing along the side of one leg, though by that same token, the Liger growled with annoyance at the two thinner, longer cuts trailing along it`s stomach from the Geno`s outstretched, clawed arm. As one, the two Zoids leered back to face each other, and with them, their pilots grimaced.   
  
"We`re pretty even," Bill commented, perhaps tinged by a bit of a competitive tone of voice that made Bit`s blood boil.   
  
"Even for now, no one stays equal with me for very long," he pointed out as if giving an insult in an arguement. Bill only matched his tone a moment later.   
  
"Same here."   
  
_ Will you two shut up and fight some more already?   
  
** Yeah, really. Standing around is just plain BORING.   
  
** Chib has a point.   
  
** HEY!   
  
**_ "Fine, fine," both grumbled back at once, just as their Zoids wheeled around completely to face one another, the Schneider`s blades swinging down and into attack mode. "I`m not taking this lightly anymore," he exclaimed threateningly, almost at his wit`s end after only a few minutes. Bill nodded sternly to himself and replied in kind.   
  
"Neither am I."   
  
_ "Here we go, Zeke,"_ Bit thought, a familiar bluish glow veiling over the actual shape of the Schneider`s main blades. _"Here we go,"_ he thought again, just as the Liger started to walk forward. _"Here we go,"_ he repeated in thought. "Here we go," he muttered to himself once more before finally...   
  
"**_HERE WE GO!!!_**"   
  
"**_BRING IT!!!_**"   
  
In another blistering exchange, the two Zoids charged, and came to a grinding halt, swinging from each other`s momentum to a dead stop as the Geno caught the Schneider by the base of one blade, using one clawed hand to do so. Both Zeke and Borealis, and Bit and Bill, poured their strength into the lock up, but neither could power through the other.   
  
The Liger was on even footing with the Geno Saurer. Neither Zoid could overwhelm the other on raw force alone, and Bit couldn`t manage to swing his blades forward because Bill`d had the foresight to make his grab on the _exact_ base of the blade, so precisely that it prevented the gears from working at all while at the same time avoiding the blade itself.   
  
"You forgot something," Bit pointed out, the Schneider`s head mounted blades on it`s right side swunging out as it turned it`s head to gain leverage. At the same time, the Geno`s head pointed down at the back of the smaller Zoid, head cannons powering up visibly for a double attack.   
  
"So did you," Bill replied in the same tone. Neither made any attack, it was a matter of psychological warfare, the kind that required both more intelligence and skill - and far more guts - than most people would ever credit to Bit Cloud, or Bill Chapman for that matter. After all, they were both underachievers, both had never gone to college and both had only barely passed high school.   
  
On that same note, both had won the Royal Cup for their teams, Bill Chapman against the Velarious Team four years earlier, Bit Cloud against Vega Obscura barely two months earlier. Despite being the same age, destiny had practically fated the two to continually accomplish similar feats, not to mention looking like near twins and both relying partially on Organoids for the majority of their skills in combat.   
  
And speaking of Organoids...   
  
_ God damn whipper-snapping punk!   
  
** Waaah! Oldie`s showin` his age!   
  
** Old?! I`m hardly old compared to Specular! You`re just a freaking pup.   
  
** A pup who`s whipping your ass.   
  
**_ "Will you two just _shut up_?!" Bill and Bit demanded just as both the Geno Saurer and the Schneider fired up their boosters, with the advantage in raw power instantly going to the Geno while the advantage in pure agility and influence instantly went to the smaller Schneider, with both Zoids completely offsetting one another. In a flurry of movement and impacts, the Schneider was thrown completely clear of the Geno, while the Geno was just thrown face first first into the ground, skidding along for several seconds before standing back up, just as the Liger slammed into the ground on it`s gut and sprang up to it`s feet in an instant.   
  
"I guess we won`t be settling this one very easily, now will we?" Bit asked, the Schneider`s side-blades swinging to point forward as a familiar aura started to glitter up around the entire Zoid`s body, bolts of electricity swirling about between the five blades mounted on the Liger`s head, both enormous head thrusters lifting up entirely like ears perking to listen for that opportune moment, the one instant where a battle could be decided.   
  
In reply, the Geno Saurer seemed to stiffen, it`s entire body going completely rigid as it turned to completely, perfectly face the other Zoid, ankle locks clamping it into place, mouth spreading wide and an equally familiar glow of charged particles erupting into view as the sphere coalesced into existence. Like the Liger, the Geno seemed to completely tense into the wait, eying it`s foe for any potential movement, anything that could give away the direction the Schneider would comit itself to for a dodge. It was like trying to hit a mosquito with a hammer; even one minute movement could screw the attack completely and leave the Geno open to reprisal.   
  
But Bill seemed unworried. In fact, he was loving every second of it in the same fashion as his opponent was, and he wasn`t afraid to say so either. "Damn right it won`t. We`re gonna make this one for the ages, _pal_," he exclaimed proudly.   
  
"Glad you agree, _buddy_. But I`m still going to make you pay for that sandwhich you cost me."   
  
** "Brad Hunter and Bram Hunt are out of the battle!"   
  
** "Eh?" Bit and Bill asked at once, glancing to see that the Fox and the Wolf had pulled off an exact repeat of their earlier draw, acing one another in the same movement as before. Even the shots had been perfectly aimed to hit in the exact places as before, the Fox with three rounds of varying sizes between it`s shoulders, the Wolf with three shots into the throat, practically blowing it open. As with before, the two former mercenaries were out of the battle.   
  
"Gee, how productive," Bill commented. "At least we can actually damage each other without knocking one another out of the battle," he added with an obvious sardonic jab at Bram.   
  
"Yeah, really," Bit muttered, turning his attention back to the Geno Saurer and cracking his neck. "Shall we?" He asked, observant to the extreme of the charged particle cannon aimed right at he and his Zoid.   
  
"With pleasure."   
  
In unison -   
  
"**_SEVEN_**-" "**_CHARGED_**-"   
  
- the attacks began -   
  
"- **_BLADES_**-" "- _**PARTICLE**_-"   
  
- a trigger was pulled, blades charged -   
  
"- **_ATTACK_**-" "- **_CANNON_**-"   
  
- an aura of blue flame shot around one, a blast of white light engulfed the front of the other`s head -   
  
"- **_GO!!!_**" "- **_FIRE!!!_**"   
  
- and in an instant, the Liger and the Geno vanished within a blinding explosion visible from across the battle, resembling a newborn star in every way as the Schneider whipped a whirlwind tide through the stream of super heated charged particles, looking like a pair of energy beams smashing into one another for several seconds. It looked like the Liger was about to win, carved through the beam by inches at a time, but the Geno refused to yield even in the slightest, dumping more and more raw energy and Zeke fought to hold his own against the raw firepower that his younger opponent, Borealis, brought to the table.   
  
"**_GIVE UP WHILE YOU`RE AHEAD!_**"   
  
"**_NOT IN MY LIFETIME!_**"   
  
The clash intensified, Bill screamed, Bit replied in kind and time seemed to stop, and then -   
  
A clash of light against light, outlined in an instant of inverse darkness. Two roars, two hissing explosions and two pained expressions.   
  
- the Liger Zero Schneider touched down behind the Geno Saurer, armor scorched fiercely at several areas, cracks showing across the surface of it`s body. Deep, brutal cuts lined the body of the larger Zoid, it`s charged particle cannon stopped firing. Even upon using their ultimate methods of attack, the two couldn`t overwhelm one another, and in an instant, the Liger roared and collapsed sideways, blades swinging out of use while the Geno Saurer`s footlocks swung up and the huge Zoid fell to it`s belly without so much as a single cry of agony, defeat, victory or satisfaction.   
  
"Can`t be over yet," Bit commented, coaxing Zeke back up on his own intensity alone. "It _cannot_ be over yet," he growled, yanking the controls and motivating the Zoid completely as the Geno rose back up with the same fire in it`s blue and red eyes, so eerily similar to those of the Organoid enhancing it.   
  
"Agreed," Bill finally said, turning his Zoid to face the other with an indignant, defiant look burned into his brown eyes. "It ain`t over `til the fat bitch sings, and she hasn`t even hummed a few bars yet."   
  
"Glad we see eye to eye," Bit commented. The next thing to pass though, dashed his hopes.   
**  
"Warning! Warning! Unauthorized personnel on the battlefield, exit immediate-"   
  
** An enormous explosion as an emerald green Whale King soared overhead, raining down a fiery hail of death onto the unsuspecting Judge and shadowing out the area of the battlefield over Bit and Bill. Both pilots grimaced angrily. "Rotten bastards," they muttered in the same tone, just as the belly of the enormous carrier slipped open in similar fashion to that of the Whale Kings favored by the Backdraft Group for carrying Zabats, but the difference here was that while they were deploying Zoids similar to the Backdraft`s Zabats, these were also different, carrying headpods like those used for Sinkers, along with faster firing machine guns and two bombs each, distinguishing themselves as being far less oriented towards reliance on sheer numbers to win a battle.   
  
They were also fast as hell. At least close to the sound barrier, though no faster for some reason or another.   
  
"Grand, them again," Bill commented sourly, still remembering the last time an unauthorized Zoid had interfered in one of his battles.   
  
"I can knock `em all out pretty quickly if you can buy me time to switch to the Panzer armor, just make sure they don`t hit our team mates."   
  
"They won`t be hitting anything when I`m done with `em."   
  
Bit nodded, Bill growled and the two Zoids broke apart, with bolts of bluish plasma and lasers ringing out behind the Schneider on it`s course for the BlitzCargo, leaving Borealis, the Geno and Chapman to fend for themselves for a short while, but that would prove just long enough.   
  
_ Bit! Turn around, now!   
  
_ The Liger swung on it`s forepaws, thrusters kicking in for breaking, just as a green bolt of energy arched wide in a spiral through the cloud of slowly thinning Foxbats, possessing a speed and agility that seemed eerily familiar, if not to Bit, then to Zeke.   
  
_ Borealis! Get out of there now!   
  
** Eh?   
  
**_ Too slow!   
  
An impact with the side of the huge Zoid and the Geno Saurer effectively vanished in a blinding flash of green, which shot up into the Whale King as the enormous Zoid carrier sang it`s song, quickly ascending away from the battlefield with surprising speed for such a large object, yet leaving it`s fighters behind.   
  
Bit growled angrily.   
  
"_Shit_," he muttered with contempt, already realizing that the whole thing had been a set up to leave the Geno unaided for a short while.   
  
_ It`s too late to help now, convert to the Panzer armor!   
  
_ "I`m goin`," Bit uttered to the Organoid, wheeling the Schneider around again and taking off in a run for the BlitzCargo once more, though this time under covering fire from both of the enormous ground carriers. With moments _not_ to spare, the Schneider vanished into the Blitz Team`s mobile base, but what emerged in the aftermath was anything but an agile, melee combatant.   
  
Extending from the side of the BlitzCargo like a green demon king, Zeke howled angrily up at his attackers, even as their bombs fell upon he and his pilot with no effect whatsoever. Steven had already flung the weighty Zoid off the side of the HoverCargo, and had also moved away accordingly.   
  
"You bastards think you can interrupt on my matches?" Bit asked with even further contempt than before. There was going to be no mercy as the armored panels on the immensely heavy Liger Zero Panzer whipped open with dozens of seperate clacks ringing out in perfect unison, the cockpit viewscreen lighting up with hundreds of independent targeting reticles, though the largest two were focused inaccurately on the tail of the fleeing Whale King.   
  
"_**I DON`T THINK SO!**_"   
  
A roar of rocketry and the thunder of the Panzer`s Hybrid Cannons and...   
  
  
The sound of over four hundred individual explosions rang in the distance, followed by the visual of two enormous orange beams of energy rippling by the huge green Zoid, tearing off into the distance while Vilhelm Rommel stared ahead. At thirty-three, he was the head of the Rommel Corporation, having ruthlessly... 'Purchased' the arms-and-Zoid manufacturing company from his younger brother, shortly after he had learned of Henry 'Surak' Rommel`s undeniably intense, lethal drug addiction to illegal sports enhancers known as stims.   
  
A handsome man by any standard, black hair and piercing green eyes, he was also more than a little tyrannical. And more than slightly skilled and thought out. His motives never seemed clear at first, his techniques often seemed flawed to those who didn`t know him well, but to know him well was to have a death wish. Vilhelm had a tendency to murder anyone who could identify a weakness in he, his plans or his goals.   
  
At thirty-three, Vilhelm Rommel was sedately calm as a green sizzle rippled into his private room, just behind him. Two dull thuds and a pained gasp later, he finally took a quiet sip of his sparkling green whine and glanced over his shoulder.   
  
"Ah, good to see the mission was successful, Spectacle."   
  
**_ I never fail,_** the green Organoid replied in kind, planting it`s foot firmly into the space between Bill Chapman`s shoulder blades, all the while holding the younger Borealis` neck in a deathgrip.   
  
"What the hell do you want from us?" Bill demanded with obvious defiance, though the question was answered in another way as Vilhelm placed his glass down, using the same hand to lift what looked like a silver choker from the table, snapping it open without a care in the world - or so it seemed.   
  
"Services. Since I can`t get Kale or Vega Obscura, and since Bit Cloud won`t be alive much longer, you happen to be the best available pilot on all of Zi - which means that if you play your cards right, I just may let you live."   
  
"Eh-**_OW!_**" Bill screamed as Spectacle put a bit more pressure behind it`s foot, causing his head to snap up and exposing his neck for all of a second. It was just long enough for Rommel to snap the choker into place, and it was both a bit too tight and a good deal uncomfortable. That done though, he stood back up and spoke.   
  
"As of the placement of that collar, you and your Organoid must do exactly as I say. Within the collar is a specially designed bomb, intended to take your head off, and in addition to that is an electroshock system instantly hotwired into the pain receptors of the base of your brain. Disobey me once - or if your Organoid disobeys me once, the collar will shock you. Twice and it will shock you into unconciousness. Thrice and it will temporarily paralize you for a week. Four times and the bomb will go off," Vilhelm explained dryly, walking back to the window after grabbing his wine again. "Do as I say and you`ll get better liberties, and more comfortable quarters. Fail and... Well, you already know," he said with a murderous chuckle, taking a sip as the door slipped open and a quartet of guards came in.   
  
Borealis growled as Spectacle unleashed him, though the green Organoid seemed eager to bite his younger counterpart`s head off on a whim.   
  
"Get out of here, Borealis," Bill ordered sternly.   
  
"Leave and your friend dies. Loyalty to him, or loyalty to your own selfishness. Take your pick."   
  
The blue-and-red Organoid paused, finally lowering it`s head with a tone of submission as the guards yanked Bill off the floor and to his feet after Spectacle moved out of the way. "Good," Vilhelm stated. "Very good. Take them to their new home for the time being, and prep their Zoid for forced evolution as well."   
  
_ "When I get this collar off of me,"_ Bill threatened angrily in though, followed by Borealis as several guards literally dragged him out of the room on his ankles. Alone with his Organoid once more, the lone head of an organization ready to carry out genocide smiled to himself.   
  
At thirty-three, Vilhelm Rommel was sedately calm.   
  
At thirty-three, Vilhelm Rommel was murderously smiling.   
  
At thirty-three, Vilhelm Rommel was getting ready to set the world ablaze...   
  


_ End Chapter Twenty-Nine  
  


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_

**Author`s Note:** Cat`s outta the bag about who Big Evil is now, eh? But who`s more dangerous, the maniac at the head of a worldwide organization, _or_ the maniac who happens to have Shadow and a Geno Saurer handy? And what of Leyon and Steve`s theories? And what`ll happen to poor Bill `n Borealis? *Evilly points at Ye Olde AHBL Button.* >D  
  
**Zinou:** Got to it in an IM once again :P  
  
**EndlessAdventure:** Yes. Yes, the shit **will** be hitting the fan pretty soon. **Very** soon in fact :P  
  
**Rhade:** Chapter 28 falls in with parts 11 of OP, and 15-through-17 of Generations as one of my all-time-favorite pieces of a story I`ve written. Glad to see it`s still having an impact on readers even two chapters later :]  
  
Hopefully this chapter wasn`t too much of a letdown. Had to re-write a bit of it at the Jamie part, and hopefully, Vilhelm is a pretty good villain so far.  
  
Well, enjoy, leave a review, Sh33p out and see ya next time!  
  



	31. The Three Snipers, Leenas Confidence

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I don`t own Zoids.  
  


* * *

  
  


**New Age**  
The Three Snipers  
Leena`s Confidence  


Two days had passed by since Bill Chapman, his Geno Saurer and the Organoid known as Borealis had all been abducted by a number of utterly unknown attackers. Little had happened in those two days. Brad was returning from a meeting with Naomi, Leena was still moping around, Jamie hadn`t shown up at all, Doctor Tauros had been on the phone more and more frequently, mostly with none other than Leyon, of all people, and Bit...   
  
Bit had spent all of that time sitting on the living room couch without speaking a word. He`d been staring at the floor, blinking once every two or three minutes on average and he hadn`t eaten at all during that time. No one had been able to get a response out of him when asking about why he was so silent and brooding, and no one had been able to even make eye contact with him for that matter.   
  
To put it bluntly: Bit Cloud was behaving as out of character was you could imagine.   
  
Why? He hadn`t known Bill Chapman _or_ Borealis very much at all, but it obviously wasn`t concern over a friend. The fact was that Bit Cloud had more intelligence than anyone - himself and Zeke included - credited him for, and that same intelligence was what was leading him to such a troubling state. He hadn`t been thinking about the plight of a rival, he`d been thinking of _why_ that rival was kidnapped instead of himself.   
  
It wasn`t too difficult a train of thought either, Bit was among the top ten pilots on planet Zi, if not one of the top five. He knew that, and he knew that if Bill Chapman was his exact equal, differing only in Organoid and Zoid preference, going by conventional logic, Bit was the more likely candidate. More people would know that _he_ defeated the Berserk Fury and Vega Obscura to become the new Royal Cup Champion, mainly since it was more recent and more sensationalized than the win that Chapman and the Thunder Team had gained to enter Class S.   
  
Besides, Bit was still essentially a rookie contender, logic screamed that a rookie would be easier to try and take down than a four and a half year veteran.   
  
For the life of him, Bit Cloud _still_ couldn`t figure it out.   
  
"Hello everyone!" Steve`s voice chirped into Bit`s ears, finally drawing him out of his stupor in time to watch Leena seeking to make off with another set of Jamie`s pants.   
  
"If ya keep that up, he`s gonna have to become a nudist," Bit pointed out, completely ignorant of anything the Doc had to say, until -   
  
"I`ve got word of our next opponents!"   
  
- the magical words trickled into that conflict prone portion of the blonde youth`s brain, promptly snapping him out of any and all mention of concern for anyone or anything.   
  
"_Opponents_?!"   
  
In a blur, Bit had Doctor Tauros by the collar, and wasn`t too long in shaking the living daylights out of him.   
  
"Who?! _**WHO?!**_"   
  
"Well-maybe-if you-stopped-strangling me-I could-tell-you," Steve replied in between getting his brain shaken out through his nose. Bit paused. "Oh, right," he said, promptly dropping the larger man like a stone. With a dull thud, Steven landed and sprang back up, shaking his head fiercely for a moment before speaking up again.   
  
"And I know it`s one that`ll excite Leena the most," he exclaimed before continuing. "Our next matches have been decided, first it`ll be the Three Snipers and _then_ the Tsun Team," he exclaimed with a grin five miles wide.   
  
"The Three Snipers?" Leena asked, almost instantly dropping the pair of pants she`d been stealing from Jamie`s laundry. The mortified expression on her face said everything, but Bit just blinked.   
  
"Who`re they?"   
  
"Only the top three Gunsniper pilots of all time," Brad answered while stepping into the living room, sipping his coffee as usual. "Their leader is Eric Johnson, the man who set the standard for precision Zoid piloting, also the uncrowned king by most people`s standards," he explained, though Bit already remembered who Johnson was from the last Zoid Trials.   
  
** [**_"Seven straight 100s in seven different trials! Eric Johnson continues his outstanding record of perfect trial runs!"_**]**  
  
"Big deal, trials don`t mean anything in a _real_ battle," Bit muttered with more than a _little_ arrogance to his voice. He had obviously forgotten the massive loss the team had taken against the Lightning Team for his arrogance the last time they`d gone up against three quasi-legends.   
  
"Bit, in case you don`t know, Eric Johnson is the reason I got a Gunsniper," Leena pointed out.   
  
"Oh, so you`re in love with him?"   
  
"**_GET REAL!_**"   
  
"Wow, nice to see you`re almost back to normal."   
  
  
"We have confirmed incoming," Lieutenant Rich Carlson stated aloud, eying the low level/ground radar like an old enemy. "It`s just one Zoid but it`s still moving with incredible speed."   
B "No doubt about it then," Major Selene Alred commented, immediately glancing to her right. "Get the walls up, arm the turrets, and start deploying every close combat Zoid we`ve got!" She ordered at an almost frantic pacing, even as those same walls - twelve foot thick, ten foot wide, eighteen foot high plates of steel - shot up out of the ground along the perimeter of the base, throwing sand and dirt all over the place in the process.   
  
The base defense turrets followed shortly after, literally coming up out of no where on the cemented over terrain behind the base walls. Machine guns, rockets, guided missiles, laser cannons and plasma guns, the sheer variety of weaponry was almost staggering, but not so staggering as the numbers of close combat Zoids to come pouring out of the base`s hangars.   
  
Command Wolves, several Shield Ligers and every Arosaurer on the base, they were all mobilized in unison, leaving the slower Gojulas, Bombard Gustavs, Europlas and aerial Zoids were kept in the base, mainly since a snap deployment wasn`t possible in the current weather. Helic aerial Zoids had always experienced trouble operating inside sandstorms, even today, that was still true.   
  
"Picking up another blip," Carlson started. "Smaller than the first... Zig zagging around it, too."   
  
"We`ve got something on the comm! Broadband!"   
  
"Put it on," the Major ordered sternly, and as she did so, a face appeared on-screen. Menacing, epitomizing threat and a murderous rage that was hidden behind a pair of dead eyes, outwardly calm, and utterly methodical.   
  
"Where is Vega Obscura?"   
  
"We`re a military installation, we don`t keep tabs on the locations of Zoid Warriors," Alred stated with a bit of contempt and a lot more courage than a dozen Guardian Force commanders had displayed when confronted with Kale Obscura`s presence.   
  
"Bullshit. The militaries of both the Guylos Empire and the Helic Republic have been keeping tabs on individual Zoid Warriors who show any sign of actual skill for decades. You`d be completely blind to potential threats otherwise," Kale stated with a dangerous lack of patience. Alred grimaced to herself. Someone had finally called the military`s bluff on keeping away from the Zoid Battle Commission, and they`d done it in one of the most dangerous ways possible.   
  
"If you try to destroy this base, you`ll be faced with the combined might of both the Guylos Empire and the Helic Republic, as well as the Guardian Force," she threatened. Kale chuckled mirthlessly.   
  
"I`ve been slaughtering every Guardian Force team sent to find me, maybe having both of the world`s biggest armies on me will liven things up a bit?" He asked with genuine seriousness peppering his voice, however vicious it was.   
  
"Not even an ace Zoid pilot could survive that. Even a legend like Raven would go down," Alred retorted sharply, earning a sharpened sigh as a fell growl filled the air across the base.   
  
"You really shouldn`t have done that, you know. I may be patient, but my... Partner, isn`t."   
  
**_ YOU USED HIS NAME IN VAIN, FOUL BITCH! NOW I`LL KILL ALL OF YOU MYSELF!   
  
_** "I`d say it was nice knowing you," Kale began as every single Zoid and human being in the base but himself and the Geno Saurer howled in mental agony. "But I`d be lying through my teeth."   
Specular groaned mentally, and in response, the Fury almost moved. _  
  
"You felt it too?"_ Vega asked, glancing emptily in the direction of the base that Kale and Shadow had just decimated in under two minutes. Shadow had obviously done most of the work, otherwise Vega wouldn`t have been feeling ripples of the Organoid`s irate Screaming, which to him sounded almost like a chorus of yells even several hundred miles away. Even Torson seemed to feel it to some extent or other, as evidenced by how he suddenly turned his headphones up after looking a bit creeped out for a moment.   
  
** I fear that there will only be more bloodshed as Shadow and Kale continue searching for you.   
  
**_ "What about you?" _**  
  
I don`t breathe. Kale obviously doesn`t care about me enough to even notice me if I wasn`t your Zoid.   
  
**_ "Point taken. How much longer do you think it`ll be before they find us?"   
  
_** Shadow already knows where we are, child. He just enjoys the meaningless slaughter that comes with Kale trying to find you.   
  
**_ "... So Kale only needs to link the dots between Stigma`s group and me. Knowing him, that won`t take too much longer."   
  
_** Dark times indeed.   
** _ "Normal? I`m not normal anymore... God damn scars... God damn Kale... God damn everything..."   
  
_ As with before, Leena was presently moping before a match, but today would promise to have several odd consequences because of her moping. In the hangar of the Blitz Team`s HoverCargo, she was sitting by herself on the foot of the Gunsniper, leaning forward haphazardly and - for the most part - avoiding social contact with anyone, which happened to include the two men standing a reasonable distance away, speaking to one another in an especially quiet sort of manner.   
  
"Hnn... You`re right," Brad Hunter finally admitted with a soft shrug. "She`s moping even more than Jamie used to. And to make matters worse, I think she`s almost on her period..."   
  
Bit Cloud blinked several times in typically blonde fashion. "Almost on her period? I thought she was _always_ on her period?" He asked with a curious tone, earning a snort from the older pilot.   
  
"I didn`t come to make jokes, Bit. You said you wanted to make a deal, make it."   
  
"Well, she`s been moping since she had her appearance screwed up, right?"   
  
"No shit, Captain Obvious."   
  
"Well, what if we tried to shift her confidence elsewhere?"   
  
"I already don`t like where this is going," Brad muttered before continuing with a long sigh. "What other place can we 'shift her confidence' to? Her piloting stinks, she`s tone deaf, destructive, impatient, her looks have gone to Hell and she can`t cook to save her life."   
  
"_Exactly_. If she can do what we seemingly can`t and beat these Three Sniper guys, she`ll be back to the old overconfident, self righteous bitch we all know and love to hate!"   
  
"... You`ve been hit on the head too many times," Brad grumbled.   
  
"... So sue me, I miss my daily beatings, alright?" Bit grumbled back. "Besides, I`ll give you half my share of the winnings if you do," he offered. Brad perked briefly before settling back down, still leaned against the wall with his arms across his chest.   
  
"You`re asking me to put my faith in Leena to win this one against the three best Gunsniper pilots of our generation, yes?"   
  
"You had faith in me to win the Royal Cup, didn`t you?"   
  
"Bit, you seem to misunderstand me here. There`s a major difference between a harmless psycho - you, and a murderous lunatic - her."   
  
"And what do you prefer, a murderous lunatic beating on a harmless psycho or a moping, angsty teenager on the verge of writing un-rhyming poetry and spouting off about how badly the world sucks?" Bit asked with an unusually logical sarcasm. Brad nodded to himself silently.   
  
"At least option number one gives me the chance to laugh morbidly at all the hospital bills you`re gonna be wracking up if she wins," he stated with a small hint of a malicious sense of humor shining through.   
  
"Gee... Nice to see you care so much about your friends," Bit muttered sarcastically.   
  
"Isn`t it though? I get half more money than usual, and I get to watch you get turned into a bloody pulp by an irate sociopath. What more can a guy need?" He asked shrewdly. Bit snorted. "How do you think we`re gonna pull this off convincingly? Run off the battlefield in fright? Get out asses kicked straight up?"   
  
"Neither. System shutdown key, press it at the most believable moment and then act panicked."   
  
"Alright, but you have to last longer than me," Brad admitted while taking out a cigarette. "You`re a better pilot than I am, even Leena knows that. If I go down first, it`ll make things more believable."   
  
"Wow Brad, you`re actually being nice..."   
  
"Only because you`re bribing me," the former mercenary stated. Bit only grinned one of those '**_PUNCH ME IN THE FACE_**'' grins, practically reading Brad like an open book and letting him know it in the process.   
_ "Definately won`t be pushovers,"_ Eric Johnson mused to himself in silence as the King Sniper, a smaller Whale King, touched down heavily on the flat ground at the very edge of the battlefield, it`s gargantuanly large mouth sliding open with a loud thud. Silence filled the cockpit of the Bolt Sniper for several more seconds before finally, Marcus Coleman`s voice sounded off, followed by the quick steps of the Blade Sniper.   
  
"Still staring at our opponents, are you?" He asked in that quirky, Elemian accented voice of his, almost audibly rubbing his lightly bearded chin in the process. Eric shrugged.   
  
"Pretty much," he admitted, hopping down the rest of the way off the side of the lower half of the carrier`s jaw, just as the Gun Panzer lumbered out into view, stepping the long way down the low jaw, unlike the Bolt and Blade Snipers. "We`ll probably have the most trouble with Hunter and Cloud, I doubt that Tauros`ll be any real issue and their air support isn`t going to be in the battle," Eric judged thoughtfully.   
  
"Long as I can wrack up some points," Jordan Terrel commented bluntly, guiding the Gun Panzer around to stand side by side with the two smaller Gunsniper variants, all of whom seemed geared toward covering the weaknesses and amplifying the strengths of the others.   
  
The Blade Sniper had almost the same armament as the Blade Liger Simulacrum, mounting a swiveling blade on either side of a back mounted weapon`s pack, one that also mounted a pair of quick firing blasters. On it`s underside, at the groin, it mounted a double impact cannon, and on it`s ankles were a pair of small, short ranged 'pepper boxes,' rocket launchers with ten small dumbfire missiles each, as well as a number of small, nearly invisible thrusters all over the body and tail, providing agility to the extreme. Unlike normal snipers though, the Blade Sniper lacked long ranged rifle, the tail was where most of it`s thrusters were placed. It`s armor was also above average for collisions, mainly since Marcus tended to fight no-holds-barred, and that included ramming an opponent. Because of this, there was also a 'cage' over the cockpit glass.   
  
The Bolt Sniper was the generalist of the three, emphasizing Johnson`s preferences for taking opponents out at any range. It had better armor, and vectoring thrusters on the outside of each ankle, and it`s leg stabilizers were both more powerful than the conventional variety, and armored as well. A four shot rocket box was mounted between the mortar-thruster units on it`s back, while two double pulse guns were placed on it`s wrists. The last piece of the Bolt Sniper`s modified arsenal were the two pivoting double machine guns - Bolt Guns - mounted to either side of the main body, easily capable of perforating a target in seconds. Unlike the Blade Sniper though, the Bolt Sniper _could_ use it`s rifle - and well.   
  
Last but not least, there was the Gun Panzer, the single most heavily armed and armored Gunsniper in existence. With armor matching that of the Liger Zero Panzer and the Berserk Fury, the Gun Panzer was just a step short of impervious to anything short of a charged particle cannon. It was also armed even more heavily, mounting a hand-aimed Panzer Cannon on it`s left side, capable of blowing holes through Whale Kings - from head on, no less. It also mounted a super laser cannon that bordered on having illegally high firepower, along with a standard gattling gun on it`s right wrist, as well as a number of targeting pods along the head. The ankles were adapted with footlock units and the tail had it`s rifle removed, it`s weight drastically increased and it`s frame stiffened to handle the insane imbalance caused by the huge mass of the Panzer Cannon alone, while every stabilizer was a dozen steps up from the norm just to compensate for the Zoid`s increased weight.   
  
All in all, the Snipes Team wasn`t a group to take lightly. To do so was literal suicide, even Harabec Davids gave the Three Snipers a bit more respect than most opponents.   
  
"Now all we do is wait," Jordan exclaimed in his usual grave voice, leaning back and biding his time for the most part. As he most often was, he was right.   
  
All there was for the Snipes Team to do was wait.   
The northernmost section of Argolose, an island just shy of twelve miles away from the northwestern coast of New Helic City. Special Agent Niles Kasagawa was in a frantic rush for survival. For three days now, he`d been running on borrowed time, dodging through more traps and missile bombardments than he could think of. Dried blood was still smeared down one side of his face, a bullet wound that had gone untreated the entire time he`d been running was still highly visible in his right side and his stolen Zoid was on the verge of collapse from the strain he`d been putting on it.   
  
The Zoid in question was an Aerosniper, a Gunsniper variant capable of powered flight for long distances over short periods of time. It`s black outline was only faintly visible in the early evening twilight, but the roar and glow of it`s thrusters was visible from a good distance away, especially to the squadron of Sinkers in hot pursuit.   
  
More gunfire rang out, Niles grit his teeth. If not for an unknown jamming field, he`d`ve been able to contact the military forces in and around the city, or even the Guardian Force, or _someone_ who could help him.   
  
As it stood, Niles was alone, outnumbered, outgunned, dying, afraid beyond words and hating every second of it.   
  
"Mayday, mayday, this is Special Agent Niles Kasagawa of the Guardian Force, do you read?!"   
  
Another flare of gunfire from the Sinkers. No response.   
  
"_Mayday, mayday, this is Special Agent Niles Kasagawa of the Guardian Force, do you read_?!"   
  
An incoming missile. No response. The Aerosniper landed with a skid, only to blast right back up off the ground again, climbing to it`s maximum altitude once more. He could just see the city, and the vague outline of the top of the sun to it`s west. Salvation was only a few more jumps away...   
  
"**_MAYDAY! MAYDAY! THIS IS SPECIAL AGENT NILES KASAGAWA OF THE GUARDIAN FORCE, DO YOU READ?!_**"   
  
The missile came closer, the city was so beautiful.   
  
"**_MAYDAY! MAYDAY!!!_**"   
  
Closer still, and then -   
  
"**_SOMEONE RESPOND, PLEASE! THEY`VE PLA_**-"   
  
- the missile hit, right into one of the two main thruster units on the Aerosniper`s back. An explosion followed, debris rained into the icy sea below and the nearby city that never slept continued shining as if nothing had ever happened at all.   
"Mobilizing Liger Zero Jaeger!"   
  
A quick blur of blue, black and white, and the Jaeger slammed down to the ground from it`s launching point near the top of the HoverCargo`s snail-like hangar section, hitting the ground in a run for several short strides before coming to a dead stop, already lined up with the Bolt Sniper, which growled with an air of intimidation to it, despite being outsized considerably by the Jaeger.   
  
"I`m going to enjoy this. A real _battle_ for once," Eric stated anxiously, drawing out a bit of annoyance from the other pilot.   
  
_ "If it weren`t for the whole 'daily beating' thing, your ass would be mine,"_ he muttered disdainfully in thought.   
  
"Mobilizing Scout Fox!"   
  
Another blur, this one a bit slower and embodied as gold and silver rather than blue, black and white. The smaller, nimbler Scout Fox touched down in a lengthier skid than the Liger had, it`s smaller size allowing it to continue on for a few seconds longer before coming to a halt just next to the Jaeger. It was met in turn by the Blade Sniper, which wasn`t even in attack mode yet. As with the previous two, the smaller Zoid, the Blade Sniper, growled threateningly, despite being visibly outsized by the Scout Fox.   
  
"I wonder if any of them have rabies..."   
  
"... I`m going to make you pay for that comment," Brad muttered, though his thoughts - _"If I wasn`t getting bribed, that is."_ - were different in the extreme.   
  
"Mobilizing Gunsniper!"   
  
This time the blur was a bit more subdued, if that was possible, zinging through the air and landing short of where both the Liger and the Fox had touched down, coming to a stop almost instantly while Leena worked to avoid outright toppling over from the added weight of all the Zoid`s weaponry. She`d touched down directly behind the other two, between them no less. Her counterpart in the face off - Jordan and the Gun Panzer - was nowhere in sight.   
  
"Where the heck is the third one?" She asked, only to be answered promptly by Bit.   
  
"Two miles ahead and to the right of us, near the center of the battlefield on a hilltop," he stated promptly, earning a well deserved grunt from Zeke.   
  
_ You do realize she can`t pull this off, right?   
  
"... Jeez, can`t **ANYONE** have a little faith in my decisions?"   
  
... You`re sure you haven`t been hit on the head too many times?   
  
"**I MISS MY BI-WEEKLY CONCUSSION, ALRIGHT?!**"   
  
Testy, much?   
  
_ The telepathic conversation ended there though, mainly due to the familiar delayed sonic boom as the Judge Capsule touched down with a roar, automatically beginning to belt out the rules of the battle without delay.   
  
** "The area within a five mile radius is a designated Zoid battlefield. All non-combatants and unauthorized personnel must leave the area at once. Area scanned. Battlefield set up."   
  
** There was an intensity on the battlefield that few things could match as Leena watched her team mates ready themselves for combat, never knowing they were going into things with the pure intention of losing.   
  
** "The Blitz Team versus the Snipes Team! Ready?"   
  
** The Blade and the Bolt crouched low, the Blade rearing back to the right somewhat and the Bolt inching to the left ever so slightly. Bit and Brad nodded to themselves and the battle -   
  
** "_FIGHT!_"   
  
** - began in earnest.   
  
The two lead Blitz Team Zoids lunged forward without hesitation, charging into battle with all guns blazing. What their attacks were met with though, was just the opposite of opponents who could be disoriented that easily. In an instant, Marcus had deployed his blades out in full attack mode, diving to the left at a low and stabbing the Liger right in the side, missing vitals by inches before pulling back out and jumping to the right. By then, Eric had already gone airborn, catching Brad off guard with disheartening ease and raking a path of precision gunfire from his Bolt Guns, throwing the larger Zoid to it`s gut at the same time that the Liger Zero toppled over sideways with a roar of pain.   
  
The response from Brad, Bit, Zeke, Leena and Steven back on the HoverCargo was uniform:   
  
"**_WHAT THE HELL?!_**"   
  
"So much for a real battle," Eric grumbled to himself at the two downed Zoids, both of which he`d been expecting a major fight from.   
  
"Maybe I didn`t have to bribe you after all," Bit mumbled in outright shock at what had just taken place. Brad was too busy scraping his jaw off the floor to even try to think of something witty to say.   
  
"I didn`t think I`d go out _that_ quick," he finally managed to say with a voice about twice as high pitched and surprised as it usually sounded.   
  
_ You do realize we`re screwed now, yes?   
  
_ No reply. Then, finally...   
  
** "Brad Hunter and Bit Cloud are out of the battle!"   
  
**_ As if we needed to be told?   
  
"I`m screwed. I`m screwed. I`m beyond screwed,"_ Leena thought with several slight twitches as the two Gunsnipers turned to face her.   
  
"Hope you don`t mind," Coleman stated plainly, swinging his blades straight forward into stabbing mode, then swiftly jogging away from the Bolt Sniper. Eric almost audibly frowned in annoyance, if only because Marcus had been hogging most of the good point making wins as of late.   
  
Leena on the other hand, was utterly terrified, reacting one sheer reflex rather than actual skull. His first thrust with a blade, she jumped back. The second followed the same course, Marcus swung his blades back into attack mode and jumped sideways this time, trying to skewer her again. Leena jumped sideways with a half twist to her own movements, bringing her face to face with the other pilot for a split second, and that was all she needed.   
  
That itch on her trigger finger was temporarily satisfied and the Blade Sniper toppled over with a dozen foot wide holes trailing down it`s collar to it`s groin, which itself had exploded the moment a round glanced into one of the barrels of the double impact cannon, striking into a shell on a fluke and setting off a chain reaction.   
  
In short, Marcus Coleman had just been trashed on a complete fluke. Leena was almost hyperventilating with excitement and adrenaline.   
  
"... Well, that was certainly unexpected," Eric mumbled with several thoughtful blinks.   
  
"**_NEXT?!_**"   
  
There was a faint glow in the distance and the Bolt Sniper literally blasted out of the way by the force of it`s ankle thrusters, launching up and to the right. Almost on shocked reflex, Leena did the same, if only because she had a habit of jumping to her right rather than her left. The result was a complete fluke of a dodge past a laser that would`ve blown a hole straight through the Gunsniper`s chest and out the back of it`s tail, sawing a trail of actual fire into the ground for several dozen yards before another delayed sonic boom shot into the girl`s ears. Again, she jumped right, and this time, a 380mm Panzer Cannon round blasted by with enough force for the sonic boom to almost throw her Zoid right off of it`s feet, slamming into the ground with a furious explosion of dust, flame and smoke, as well as rapidly glassing dirt.   
  
"Keep dodging!" Her father yelled over the comm, and Leena again jumped to the right, only to hop back an instant later as the Bolt Sniper slammed down where she`d been standing. Her trigger finger was fast, but Johnson`s well honed reflexes were faster, allowing him to rocket jump straight up again and dodge a hail of bullets, only to found out that his dodge wasn`t good enough.   
  
"**_EAT MORTAR!_**"   
  
"Ah, shit."   
  
The flaming hulk of what had been the Bolt Sniper landed a second later, with Johnson already drifting down on a parachute while Leena fought off the urge to jump around ecstatically. It had taken up half of her rocket and bullet ammunition to nail the Blade and the Bolt, but she still had some left and she was going to put it to good use.   
  
"Here we go, baby," Leena said to herself, already seeming to slip back into her old pattern of thought, but this time she was more cautious, taking time to aim at her target. Even at a distance of two miles, the Gun Panzer stuck out like a sore thumb, and it was well within the range of both the Wild Weasel unit`s targeting systems, and the range of her guns. It took a split second, and then Leena had sent off everything she`d had left, promptly dodging to the left this time and avoiding Jordan`s preemptive attacks in one full swoop, just as the ground she`d been standing on burst into flames from the impact of a flaring orange laser beam.   
  
There was an enormous explosion just over a second later, just as the Judge spoke up.   
  
** "Marcus Coleman and Eric Johnson are out of the battle!"   
  
**_ "Then that means..."   
  
_ "You should`ve brought a bigger pea shooter."   
  
Another delayed sonic boom, Leena jumped out of the way frantically, the ground beside her tore apart in flames, dust, glass and smoke. Another beam followed, again she dodged though, but only by a few inches.   
  
"Run to your right and try to close in. He`s big and clumsy so it`ll take him a few seconds to turn and aim as you get closer," Brad stated over the broadband, not exactly caring if Terrel heard him or not.   
  
"I`m out of ammo though!" She yelled back at him, prompting another response.   
  
"Leena, you`re in a Gunsniper."   
  
"So?! He`s in one too!"   
  
"He meant a Gun_sniper_," Bit emphasized with a similar tone to what Brad had been using. In an instant, she understood, taking off in a wide run towards the right, even as the Panzer tried to turn and keep up with a drawn out laser beam, trailing by inches at first but with the gap growing wider and wider with every stride the Gunsniper made, until Leena had made what she was willing to bet was a good ten to fifteen seconds ahead of the laser, then went to a skidding halt while turning halfway around, the Zoid`s tail already straightening out in a matter of two seconds, going rigid and extending several feet in total.   
  
As this happened, the chair reclined back, twisting around and holding her prone with the trigger in hand. It wasn`t comfortable, but it`d have to do.   
  
_ "Aim for a stabilizer in the leg,"_ she thought almost automatically at the zoomed in view of the insane amount of armor on the Gun Panzer. Eight seconds went to waste as Leena tried to steady her nerves for the shot, and the last five -   
  
_ "Please..."   
  
_ - ticked by -   
  
_ "Hit..."   
  
_ - like an eternity -   
  
_ "Home..."   
  
_ - all the while, facing imminent elimination by the oncoming laser beam. With only a slight hesitation, the targeting reticule aiming for the knee stabilizer on the right leg, Leena pulled the trigger. A crack of the gun, the hum of the laser and -   
  
_ "Come on!"   
  
_ - the Gun Panzer let out a screech, toppling over sideways with a loud thud. The laser promptly cut out on auto, while the Zoid`s leg had completely buckled at the knee, tagged so perfectly that the cap had flown off and internal gears had been otherwise unscathed. Jordan screamed irately at the result, while Leena just gaped at her own victory.   
  
And then came that cracked, sadistic smile.   
  
"Heh heh... I... Actually... _Beat_... The Three Snipers... **_ALONE!_**"   
  
And after that, there was a twitch and a bit of psychotic, demoralizing laughter as Bit Cloud and Brad Hunter emerged from the cockpits of their Zoids, the latter smoking a cigarette, the former still in relative shock to what just happened. Zeke was as cynical as ever about it all.   
  
_ ... Well, for the first time in just about two-hundred or more years, someone`s actually proven me wrong. A human no less. A completely ordinary, mildly psychotic, non-Zoidian blooded human.   
  
_ Bit and Brad on the other hand...   
  
"Least we won, eh?"   
  
"... You do realize she actually did that _on her own_, right?"   
  
"I somehow doubt she`ll be letting us forget that anytime soon," Brad stated rather plainly, taking a slow drag off of his smoke while Bit just shook his head and sat down on the side of the Liger`s head.   
  
"That also means I don`t have to pay you, now do I?"   
  
"You`re right. You don`t. But then again, neither of us will be paid since our checks are probably going to fixing the damage our Zoids took."   
  
"... Crap."   
  
And as for Marcus and Eric...   
  
"Last time I ever underestimate psychotic teenaged girls with reddish-pink hair and a fetish for high explosive chaingun rounds," the Elemian gent commented with an utterly defeated expression as Eric finished parachuting down to the ground, giving only a sage nod in response. It was really all the veteran could think to do.   
  
"**_WHO`S THE BEST GUNSNIPER PILOT NOW, HUH?! I BET NAOMI`LL CRAP HERSELF WHEN SHE FINDS OUT ABOUT THIS!!!_**"   
  
Brad twitched slightly, Bit followed suit.   
  
"Was it really that smart to let her win like that?"   
  
"... I don`t think we had much of a choice."   
  
"Remind me never to accept a bribe from you again."   
  
"Deck me next time I try."   
  
"With pleasure."   
  


_ End Chapter Thirty-One  
  
_

* * *

  
  


**Author`s Note:** Well, did I drag that one out enough for you? Took the whole smeggin` story to pull that off but I got through it eventually :P Consider this Leena`s big shining moment so far.  
  
*Leers at the 'Make Shit Hit The Fan' button.* @_@ Heh heh hehhhh...  
  
**Zinou:** As usual, spoke about it already :P  
  
**X DJ Wolfwood X:** How about letting me work through the story first? I already got the next book and a potential prequel lined up as is, not to mention work on the Hybrid Theory series and a potential Cowboy Bebop fic.  
  
**ZeonReborn:** Nice to see you`re back :D *Tosses... Fangirl tongue since you already have WAY too many cookies for your own good.* And since you`re wondering: I specifically made Bit and Leena distantly related so people wouldn`t want to see them paired up in NA. At most, they`ll be friends and they might learn about the relation thing, but don`t expect romance. I doubt Bit will hook up with **anyone** in NA and the same goes for Leena. As I`ve said before: Romance is _**NOT**_ my preferred field of writing. To be blunt: I usually suck at it. Plus I despise fluff. With a passion.  
  
**EndlessAdventure:** Yes, Borealis is now the youngest Organoid. That has a story of it`s own but... That`ll be explained later.  
  
**JCKilla:** I do respect your oppinion, but I`m the one writin` the story yanno... And since you`ve made so many points, here are my replies to them all:  
  
1: I never decide my battles by raw power without a damn good excuse for it. Skill determines everything in most battles that I write, the same is true for New Age. The Fuma Team are not good Geno Saurer pilots, with Warsharks they`re great but Raven with a Geno Saurer would mangle all four of them with ease. The Ultimate Xs are powerful, yes, but not invincible.  
  
2: I need only point to the Red Blade Liger. It`s not an Ultimate X and it moves on it`s own. U-X Zoids are **not** the end-all, be-all as far as New Age goes. They may be powerful but they`re not invincible. And yes, I agree to a point about the Zoid cores and the man-made Zoids, but I think that while they may be the norm, there **are** exceptions to the rule.  
  
3: I made the name up. It sounds virtually the same as Leena, just replace the Lee with an Ri. Ties in to how Leyon thinks she looks so much like her mother.  
  
If ya want to continue any sort of debate, feel free to do so in mails rather than reviews. Just a request.  
  
That`s all for now folks, read, review, enjoy and see ya next time! Sh33p out.  
  



	32. Chaos Building

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I do not own Zoids. I do however, own a fanatical, raving hatred of the band, 'Simple Plan.'  
  


* * *

  
  


**New Age**  
Chaos Building 

There was a loud crash of multi-ton feet to the steel reinforced flooring of the enormous maintenance room as the magnetic gear finally slowed to a halt and drew away. A black silhouette of something that likely should have never even been born. The apparent final step in a three stage evolution, from Geno Saurer to Geno Breaker, the Fury was something that held an imposing and intimidating air to it even when it wasn`t equipped with it`s armor systems, a nature bolstered by the newly revitalized orange glow of it`s optics.   
  
** Someone call the presses... The greatest bitch of them all is back.   
  
** Vega quirked up a brow at the huge Zoid but said nothing, allowing his emotions to do the talking for him. For what it was worth, he got the equivelent of a dulled chuckle in the form of a low physical growl and an eerie, melodic laugh that seemed to come from several voices at once, a laugh that no one else was going to hear. Torson had left his shift for the bathroom and Dana, the senior member of Vega`s crew, was busy helping with work on the Elephander after one of it`s more recent match-ups.   
  
"How`re you feeling?" Vega finally asked. There was a delay in the answer, and for a moment, the Fury looked as though it was busy stretching it`s limbs out, getting rid of annoying cramps and the like. Then...   
  
** Like an entirely new Ult... Wait, what are they called again?   
  
** "Ultimate X Zoid. In your case, I think it`s X Fury, Ultimate X Fury or Fury X, not sure."   
  
** ... Not too original with the naming, if you ask me.   
  
** "Blame whoever came up with the term, not me," Vega said with a shrug, turning around and glancing over his shoulder at the door. It hadn`t opened yet, but Vega could open it himself with no real trouble. Just a minor push of a button.   
  
A push of a button that he wouldn`t be the one making. With almost expert timing, the main door of the oversized room slipped open, creaking once or twice in the process but revealing only one man standing at it`s very center. An older fellow, silver hair and an eerie resemblance to an older Kyle Mazemia, Stigma Stoller held the look of a patient father for all of a split second before speaking up.   
  
"I`ve got word of your next match."   
  
"Kale is my only priority right now."   
  
"You either win a match or I`m going to have to drop the Fury from my roster, Vega. Including the Storm and Razorwind units. After you get another win, you can go get yourself half-killed. Again," the retired veteran stated with an obviously cynical attitude to his words. Vega was obviously taken with the amusement of an eleven year old - which is exactly what he was.   
  
"I was only a _quarter_ killed this time, thank you," he said, puffing out his chest and crossing his arms over it.   
  
** And you have the nerve to think I`m strange?   
  
** Fire. A fire is coming. _ An apocalypse is what we will bring. Death to all, not just what breathes, but what does not breathe as well. Chaos. _  
  
I only want those that breathe to die. Anything else doesn`t matter.   
  
_ Come. Together, we can reap the benefits of It and slaughter anything and everything that lay in our path. Come with me, Shadow, together, you, I and the pup can quicken the pacing with ease.   
  
_ I must have Kale with me. Otherwise it is futile.   
  
_ Kale is inconsequential. He will be consumed by the flames like everyone else who fails to bow before us.   
  
_ I need him for my own goals, Spectacle. And I`m not interested in playing second fiddle to another like Ambient.   
  
_ Ambient? He was a weak minded fool. I possess all that you need... Our powers together can accomplish anything!   
  
_ I. Don`t. Care. About. World. Domination. I want my revenge on mortality, anything else is unimportant.   
  
"You can go if you want to. I only need you to quicken the pace, remember?" Kale interrupted the conversation with little care for either of the other participants, murderously leering down at them both from the chest of the Geno Saurer. Both seemed to freeze for a moment, but only a moment.   
  
"I heard everything you said," he stated blandly. Spectacle seemed to snort for a second or two, inching back from Shadow in what could only be described as hesitation. The green Organoid hadn`t forgotten it`s last encounter -   
  
** [**_Crouched ruthlessly for the strike. He waited. He waited still as they spoke, and then he began to move forward, but a strike over the head halted his movements with agonizing swiftness. Fluidity and speed like few the Organoid had ever encountered, and a ten pound, weighted chunk of metal called a car battery being swung at close to fifty miles an hour were more than any creature short of a full fledged Zoid could bare without a moment`s notice.   
  
Seconds later, there was a repeat. Spectacle had been trying to stand and the battery came into play again, leaving a dent across the side of the green Organoid`s head. He was down this time, and he wasn`t going to get up for at least a while longer._**]   
  
** - and was keen to avoid a repeat.   
  
Is that... Fear?   
  
_ Caution. Fear is my ally, not my enemy.   
  
_ But caution is born of fear, you are afraid of but a single human being with an inkling of Their blood? My, perhaps you`re not as powerful as you claim... _  
  
Silence.   
  
_ "Make your choice, Shadow. There`s a base in the distance and I don`t intend to wait around for you," Kale growled, his voice booming through the loudspeaker of the Geno Saurer. Spectacle let out a growl of his own in response, shifting slightly, those menacingly golden eyes focused solely on Shadow. There, the two stood. Like a meeting centuries before, between an empowered Ambient and a then-young Shadow.   
  
Spectacle`s shape resembled Ambient`s. The chin was different, he lacked the tail spikes, but the overall feeling was almost the same. Shadow didn`t like that. He had never liked Ambient, and he wouldn`t like anything remotely resembling the long dead, crimson Organoid ever again.   
  
Go away. _  
  
Have it your way. When the flames come, I`ll be sure to grant you the dignity of being one of the first to die.   
  
_ Assuming I don`t kill you first.   
  
_ You assume too much. That will be your undoing...   
  
_ And you assume even more. That will be why I eat your core out. Preferably with some Zoid Magnite for spicing.   
  
_ Touché.   
  
_ And with that, a flash of green came to pass and Spectacle was gone, blazing off into the skies like a bolt of green lightning while Shadow unfolded his wings and flapped up onto the right shoulder of the Geno Saurer. He said nothing and he thought nothing, and neither did Kale in response. Together, they shot off towards the nearby base, no goal in mind for Shadow other than death, no goal in mind for Kale other than information.   
And miles from there, hundreds of miles in fact, a meeting of minds was taking place. For three and a half hours, the top brass of the Helic and Guylos militaries, along with the top officials of the Zoid Battle Commission and the Guardian Force had been locked in a heated debate about none other than Kale himself. For all of that time, things were mostly an even split down the middle, half for devoting at least a special task for to dealing with him, half utterly against anything but the Guardian Force handling it.   
  
As with any such debate, the loudest voices tended to be the least educated on the subject.   
  
"If we sit here and let him do whatever he wants, it sets a dangerous precedent for other terrorists to follow!"   
  
"Well maybe if we could find out why he`s doing this-" "It doesn`t matter why he`s doing this! The man has slaughtered over eight thousand people already! It`s time for action, not talk!"   
  
"We need to let the Guardian Force sort this out!"   
  
"**_THE GUARDIAN FORCE? FOR GOD`S SAKE, THEY`VE BEEN SLAUGHTERED EVERYTIME THEY`VE GONE UP AGAINST HIM!_**"   
  
"**_BUT IF WE ALLOW THE MILITARIES OF EITHER NATION DECIDE HOW THIS PLAYS OUT, IT SETS UP FOR THE POSSIBILITY OF INFRINGEMENT ON CIVILIAN LIFE!_**"   
  
"**_WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?! WE CAN`T AFFORD TO ALLOW THIS MANIAC TO CONTINUE DOING WHATEVER HE WANTS! IT`S SUICIDE TO NOT TRY AND DEAL WITH HIM NOW!_**"   
  
"Enough screaming," interrupted the utterly calm voice of General Otto Schubaltz. "There`s no doubt that Kale Obscura is very likely the most significant threat that`s faced the world in over two hundred years, but right now he`s only one of two problems we`re dealing with. With the fall of the Backdraft, there`s a power vaccum going on in the criminal underworld. Illegal battle groups are starting to sprout up left and right, rampant attempts at terrorism have been on the increase, Zoid pilots are being kidnapped by some unknown force and a maniac is running around gunning down everything in sight. We can`t afford inaction and we can`t afford delays any longer. The military may be a divisive solution, but right now it`s our only real choice."   
  
A brief pause as the assembled group started to calm down. Schubaltz continued.   
  
"I propose that we solve these things methodically. It`s obvious that the Guardian Force has become too set in it`s ways, and the militaries have been caught completely off guard when it comes to dealing with random guerrilla warfare tactics by unassociated individuals or groups. It`s time for a change, gentlemen. We have to bring the military into the fold on this one and we have to do it fast. In addition, it`s time to start deputizing the people who`ve actually shown both the willingness and the actual skill and courage to do anything."   
  
"You`re not suggesting what I think you are, are you?" One of the three Majors asked with obvious disdain.   
  
"As incorrect as it may sound, yes. I am."   
  
"Tournament fighters are _not_ meant to be soldiers," another Major pointed out with the same disdain as the one before her.   
  
"Maybe they`re not, but that doesn`t matter right now. Desperate times call for equally desperate measures," Otto stated bluntly, finally opening his slate gray eyes and leering over the group with little more than a calm, thoughtfully strategic gaze. "And right now, we`re as desperate as they come."   
"Did you hear that?" Bit asked, glancing over at Brad with a half-dazed expression. The former mercenary, who was currently seeking a small respite from Leena`s newly revived sense of pride in herself, only quirked up a brow at his blonde team mate. The two were in the hangar, again. As with before, Brad was leering uneasily at the Scout Fox, and Bit was perched up on a catwalk just above the Liger Zero`s head. The Zoid had been switched back to it`s base armor, mainly since that armor seemed to make it self-repair quicker, while the Jaeger armor had to be repaired still.   
  
_ "Must be my imagination,"_ he reasoned dryly, leaning forward onto the support for the safety rail. Liger seemed somewhat... Unenthused? Bit noticed this, as well.   
  
_ "You hear it too, buddy?"_ He asked, glancing down at the Zoid beneath him.   
  
_ Familiar. I know that voice. I know that song. Open your mind, and listen to it with me.   
  
"I`m not a Grade A telepath, ya know... I don`t even know how the heck I talk to __you_, let alone listen to others."   
  
Fiona can do it. It`s in your blood. Just relax. Focus in on a sound, attain calm and it`ll come to you.   
  
The young man shrugged. He rarely understood Zeke`s mood swings, from sardonic to deep and thoughtful, ready to fight to ready to exchange philosophical views. Sometimes, he wondered if the Ultimate X was really even sane anymore, not that he`d ever really known Zeke prior to bonding with the Liger. Regardless of his own thoughts on the matter though, Bit shrugged and began to hum to himself. It briefly drew attention from Brad, but only the usual 'what is he on?' type of expression.   
  
Seconds passed by. He heard nothing. Eyes closed, mind as open as he could manage it and Bit Cloud _still_ heard nothing. Zeke rumbled something inaudible, even telepathically, and then silenced again.   
  
Then came that strange sounding voice. Like a song, almost. A song sung in a language of names. After several seconds though, Zeke muttered indignantly.   
  
_ If you have something to say, say it.   
  
_ The response was simple. The song picked up at a high point, the word was simple and it was a name. In the Zoidian language, it translated as 'open,' 'spirit,' and 'end.'   
  
The word was Fiona. The garbled chatter that followed was something Bit couldn`t understand even if he wanted.   
  
_ "Wonto, regoh. Renotha, otni marheno, mofry awa. Yen rouja hevota Bit froimet siti."   
  
_ While Bit didn`t understand it - aside from his name, that is - Zeke did. With a moment to spare, the Zoid stepped forward, rumbling lowly and flipping it`s cockpit open, standing directly beneath the young man without a single movement. This time, Brad _did_ take notice.   
  
_ Get in.  
  
_ "What`s with the Liger?" He asked, glancing over attentively, the brow formerly just quirked up slightly now bordering the midway point up his forehead, watching as Bit wordlessly stood up and started to climb over the edge of the railing. "Whoa, Bit! Hold it!" Brad yelled as the teen slipped over the rail, falling a short distance right into the cockpit of the Liger Zero, which gave a roar and promptly took off out of the open hangar door, blazing off into the desert.   
  
"Bit! We have a match tomorrow, remember?! _**BIT!**_"   
  
Brad would`ve been better off yelling at a corpse for attention rather than the distancing form of the Liger, and in it, Bit Cloud.   
  
"_Crap_," he muttered to himself, leering around the hangar for something to give chase in. The jeeps weren`t fast enough, Jamie had taken the Raynos and the Gun Sniper couldn`t move fast enough no matter how hard Leena pressed it. That left one choice.   
  
The Scout Fox.   
  
Brad hesitated though, looking at the Zoid with an uneasy appearance to his eyes. That was when he heard it.   
  
Or, to be more specific, that was when he heard _her.   
  
"Don`t use it for anything other than battles,"_ came the voice laced with warning into his mind, though something audibly similar to a giggle and a chuckle at once came not soon after. Uneasily, the former mercenary whipped around in a circle, trying to find the source.   
  
All he saw was a vague outline melding into the shadows.   
  
And then there was nothing.   
  
"How the hell am I gonna explain this one?" Brad muttered to himself, feeling more disdain than usual for the ever annoying Bit Cloud.   
The northeasternmost corner of the Guylos mainland. At one time, this area was a military fortress during the last decades of the Ancient Zoidian people, one of the last such places to be demolished by the Death Saurer and other renegade Zoids during the murderous rampage that had trampled the ancient civilization of planet Zi into the dirt.   
  
Today, it was the site of an archaeological dig funded by the Helic Republic, despite being in Guylos territory. The group wasn`t known to the public, it wasn`t known to exist as far as most military circles went - the Guardian Force included - and it was almost entirely unknown by Guylos Imperial intelligence, and the entire group was armed to the teeth. It was probably the only modern 'combat history preservation unit' in existence, evolved off of the old groups like the one once headed up by Dan Fleiheit`s squad during the Helic-Guylos wars.   
  
Once, the area had been a magnificently imposing stronghold, walls stretching a hundred and fifty feet high, six feet thick, made of the strongest material available and enhanced with an energy shield that was comparable to modern standards. It had housed dozens of Zoids, Zoidians and Organoids, including a special pair who held distinction even then. The archaeologists weren`t interested in that though.   
  
They were more interested in the gigantic chamber once hidden beneath a thirty foot thick layer of rock and dirt, accessable only through a staircase that lead to a near-unbreakable pair of doors covered in unknown writings.   
  
Now though, they were on the border of the chamber, just about to break through.   
  
"Alright, _try it again, Mack_!" One of the crewmen shouted, jumping out of the way. The Gojulas-H, a non-combat variation of the original Gojulas design packing four Spinosapper-sized laser saws and two enormous Godos-styled piston drivers, leaned forward slowly, four lengthy, thin poles extended out of it`s chest, helping to hold the huge Zoid steady to do it`s work.   
  
The sound of four swift slashes followed, each laser saw cutting into the structure`s outer wall, then retracting away. Slowly, the piston hammers rose out of their former neutral position, dropping back down and aiming directly forward along either side of the huge Zoid`s head. Both pistons drew back, beginning to whirl like drill bits before launching forward with an explosion of steam hot enough to melt the skin off of someone`s bones.   
  
The result was favorable though. For the time being. The wall shattered into an imperfect square, revealing nothing inside but blackness and a gush of extremely cold air that held the same stench as modern day coolant fluids.   
  
"We got it!" The pilot of the Gojulas exclaimed proudly, automatically swinging the cockpit hatch open and breaking into a coughing fit at the stink of the gas. The gas was the least of their problems though...   
  
"What the heck?" One of the archaeologists voiced as a pair of Zoid-sized crimson eyes lit up from within the blackness of the chamber.   
  
Roc was awake.   
"You could have at least had the decency to`ve told me, ya know," Naomi muttered, sipping her usual tea a few seconds later. Leon was impassive about it all, he didn`t really seem to see the big deal behind why Naomi was so annoyed about his choice of action a few days earlier. Either way, the man at least had the decency to try some diplomacy about it. There weren`t exactly many ways to say 'I had an impulse to go 300 miles that-a-way for no apparent reason at the time,' but Leon tried anyway.   
  
"I had a feeling. It was all I had to go on and I felt like I had to hurry. Besides, it proved right, didn`t it?" He asked shortly, taking a sip of his coffee without another word. Naomi frowned deeply.   
  
"And what if it hadn`t?"   
  
"Then it`d just be a random fluke that would never happen again," Leon answered dryly, finally looking up to meet Naomi`s fairly annoyed gaze with a look that rested somewhere between apathy and understanding. Where and which it was closer to was anyone`s guess, his own included. "And if it had turned to trouble?" Naomi asked darkly.   
  
"If it had turned to trouble, I would`ve fought my way through it or run away like I usually do. Besides, at least I wasn`t challenging anyone to an _illegal_ Zoid battle," he pointed out blandly, lowering his voice just so for emphasis. Most people wouldn`t have really seen the point in such a statement being made in a conversation about someone running off recklessly, but Naomi was a person who tended to remember things very well. Among the things she specifically remembered was her first face-to-face meeting with Leon Tauros.   
  
"Point taken," she conceded with the same annoyed tone as before. "I just don`t want you going off and getting hurt."   
  
"We`re not-" "I didn`t mean like that," Naomi cut him off, earning a long nod from her team mate. "You`re like a big brother to me, and if you did anything stupid, it`s my firm obligation to kick the hell out of you."   
  
"And if I die?"   
  
"If you die, I`d have to kill you for it."   
  
A pause.   
  
"Gee, that`s reassuring," Leon grumbled out dully, earning a small smirk from Naomi. "Isn`t it though?"   
  
Activity in the diner was low but still loud enough to have a decent conversation, when it finally dawned on Naomi that someone was missing, mainly since Harabec was apparently working for two people at once, it seemed. "Where`d that Abbie girl go?" She asked.   
  
"She and her boyfriend went on vacation, I think," Leon answered with a nonchalant way about him. "Who`s the boyfriend?" Naomi asked out of mild curiosity. "Marcus Harlock." Naomi almost choked on her tea for a second or two. "Small world, isn`t it?" Leon asked with a very subtle jab hidden in his tone, drawing a sharp leer from the side in response.   
  
It was about that moment that a woman bearing an obvious resemblance to the aforementioned Abigail Summers stepped through the doors of the resturaunt, idly pacing her way across the floor and settling down with a plop on the stool next to Naomi.   
  
Green hair, a tan to die for, an attitude that dripped 'I`m a bad ass and I make it look _good_,' a leather biker`s jacket, jeans that were a bit tight and a pair of army-styled boots, matched off with a pair of relatively out-of-place-in-a-good-way eyes tinged an alluring shade of purple. Naomi only offered the woman a raised eyebrow, shaking her head briefly. Leon almost swore he heard her say something along the lines of 'hussy' under her brother, but he chose not to speak.   
  
"Hey Beck!" The woman called out, giving a wave over to the older man, who attentively gave a wave back in response. "Long time no see, Pierce," he finally replied after walking over. "Come to pick on your little sister some more, huh?"   
  
"Actually no, some guy named Oscar said he`d meet me here. Where is the little prude, anyway?"   
  
"On an overdue vacation with Mark," Harabec answered, causing both Leon and Naomi to leer sideways at each other for the umpteenth time in one morning.   
  
It was a _damn_ small world after all, wasn`t it?   
  
And it got even smaller as the doors swung open again, another older man stepping in, this one a bit shorter than Harabec but still the same weight thanks to his slight gut. Messy headed, wearing the get-up of a crop duster pilot and a serious expression that contrasted it to the extreme.   
  
Oscar Hameros sat down wordlessly next to Pierce Summers, giving a nod to Harabec.   
  
"You wanted to see me?" Pierce asked with a nonchalant, perhaps somewhat annoyed sound to her voice. "Yep. About your dad, too," Oscar answered shortly. "Probably best we go somewhere else to talk about it," he added. Pierce nodded in agreement.   
  
Leon and Naomi exchanged another leer, and for a second, Leon looked as though he would speak. Naomi cut him off again.   
  
"One word about the world getting any smaller and I`ll cram you into a meat grinder," she threatened. Leon shut up instantly.   
"Welcome back," Brad sighed out annoyedly as Jamie climbed out of the Raynos, drawing the teen out of a stupor with his expression alone, not even counting the tone of his voice.   
  
"What happened? Where`s Bit?" Jamie asked, walking down the catwalk and then climbing the way down to the hangar floor. Brad shifted. "He took off on his own like a lunatic. Where were you?"   
  
"Private stuff, you don`t need to know," Jamie replied firmly, receiving a mental cheer from the Wild Eagle as a result. "We came close to losing a match because you weren`t there, I think we have a right to know."   
  
"It was personal. That`s all you need to know, Brad," Jamie shot back, taking his gloves off with a sneer.   
  
"Well, Jamie, I was doing some research earlier today, before Leena went on a tirade about how good she`s gotten - conveniently ignoring how much of your clothing she`s stolen through the past few days," Brad began. "And I found an interesting fact out about tomorrow`s opponent, know what it is?"   
  
Jamie dumbfoundedly quirked a brow up. "What?" He asked.   
  
"With Bit gone for who-knows-how-long," Brad paused briefly to take a drag from his cigarette. "That means you`re going to be in the battle. Our opponents, or should I say 'opponent,' is the Tsun Team. I`m guessing you`ve heard of the one fighter on that team, yes?" He asked again, staring Jamie dead in the eyes. The teen let out a mortified gulp.   
  
"That`s..."   
  
"Yes. That team is the same team that Leyla Tsun is on, she happens to be the only fighter. What side will you be on Jamie? Our`s, or her`s?"   
  
A brief mental nudge from the Wild Eagle. It wasn`t much, but it accomplished what the secondary personality wanted.   
  
"The same side I`ve always been on, Brad," he answered. The former mercenary nodded, thinking everything was alright.   
  
It wasn`t.   
  
"_My own._" The sound of a cigarette being dropped on the floor to the dull background noise of a young man with two personalities walking away followed soon after.   
  
The Scout Fox had made him uneased, Leena had put him on edge, Bit`s departure had left him completely frazzled, he`d heard an unexplainable voice from the shadows and now Jamie was making him paranoid about who he could and couldn`t trust, and on top of all that, he had just dropped his last, _god damn_ cigarette and accidentally bit the filter off of it just beforehand.   
  
All in all, Brad Hunter was not having a very good day.   
Garamos Island, the middle of the Deldaros Ocean, just a few hundred miles south of the equatorial line. On any conventional map, Garamos island was exceptionally close to the exact middle of the planet, earning it the nickname 'Center of the World' among the tourist industry. Politically, Garamos was independent from both the Guylos and Helic nations, even though it was still well within the jurisdiction of the Guardian Force. It was the Zian equivelent of Switzerland and Jamaica having a bastard child, temperately warm all year round but completely neutral from all conflicts.   
  
For Marcus Harlock, Garamos Island was the place for fun in the sun, a nice getaway with Abbie, a well earned vacation from the hectic world of Zoid battling. The bags under his eyes were disappearing, he`d had a doped up grin for the past two days and was presently reading a magazine on the beach. It was raining, the reason for a particularly large beach umbrella to be planted firmly in the sand to his side. The chair he sat in was actually a plastic-made pool chair, fully reclining among other things but wide enough to accomodate two people.   
  
The other person was Abbie, who had been giddily taking in the sights of the entire island during the entire time. At least the entire time the two were able to leave their hotel room - but _**that**_ is another story for another day entirely. It was also the reason Mark had been wearing such a doped up grin for two days straight, but that`s not the point here.   
  
The rains of Garamos were actually the entire reason they were on the beach. This was because Garamos Island happened to have the most unique weather in the entire world, it was _always_ sunny when it rained, but the effect of the sun and the rain at once, combined with the dozens of strategically placed 'mirror stations' just off the shore of the island meant that every time it rained, the beaches and the cities alike both lit up with hundreds upon thousands of rainbows of varying size, from ribbons to full fledged myths where one could almost smell the pots of gold, the rain was half the reason there were actually tourists to begin with.   
  
However the reasons for the average tourist though, the reason for one individual in particular was quite different. Standing off to the side in a black trench coat, this particular man stood out like a very sore thumb compared to the hundreds of summer clad locals and tourists around him, the fact that his face seemed to have an unnatural benevolence and affection to it added to this appearance.   
  
He was also holding a pair of binoculars.   
  
Said binoculars were trained on the form of a green haired young woman in a two-piece bathing suit situated to an ordinary looking young man who looked like he was coming out of a crash course in studying the effects of sleep deprivation firsthand. In one eye, there was hatred for the young man. In the other, which didn`t look entirely real, was an undying, sadistic lust and affection for the young woman.   
  
Sheathed out of sight across his back was a weapon known as a Khukiri knife - a Khukri - specifically stolen from the dormatory where the young woman lived, the same place and the same college where the young man was keeping most of his belongings during their vacation.   
  
Among those were his gun - destroyed - and the knife that the individual had sheathed, hidden in his trench coat.   
  
This individual was named Arihmanes.   
  
He had come with specific orders to eliminate one of the two people on Zi who could actually identify the Rommel Corporation as part of the reason that so many unreasoned, uncalled for attacks had been happening across the Guylos and Helic border zones, and potentially give away bits of details that could bring the Corporation down before it`s leader had accomplished his goals.   
  
He had come with specific _intentions_ of his own, as well. One was to follow orders with a sick smile and kill Marcus Harlock by any means necessary. The other was to take Abigail Summers. Whether she welcomed the changes he intended to make or not.   
  
This individual was named Arihmanes.   
  
He was a murderer, a Zoid pilot and a borderline psychopath.   
  
He was also obsessed with Marcus and Abbie.   
  
_ Someone_ was going to die.   
  
Soon.   
  


_ End Chapter Thirty-One_  
  


* * *

  
  
**Author`s Note:** Sorry about the slight delay for this one, but with any luck, I`ll be picking up the pace **very** soon... *Currently in the process of shifting from the Slowly Built Up Lingering Conspiracy-Styled Plot Button to the All Hell Breaks Loose Button.* >_> And didn`t I say I already had the connections to bring in Pierce? Voila, there she is. She`s been brought in for the specific purpose of fleshing out a bit more of the past, in specific, the past of one of the only characters I`ve really neglected: Abbie. She`ll also show up a lot more eventually, but now ya know.  
  
**Rhade:** I pity Brad and Jamie the most. Leena`s normal punching bag has been removed, that leaves only them to soak up the abuse >_>; And expect Jamie to get some more attention soon. I happen to have big plans for that little runt... **And** his secondary personality.  
  
Well, that`s all for now folks. Leave a review, enjoy, Sh33p out and see ya next time! 


	33. Eternal

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I do not own Zoids.  
  
**Foreword:** I suggest downloading the song "Eternal" by Evanescence. Suits this chapter quite nicely.  
  


* * *

  
  


**New Age**  
_ Eternal_   
  
  
  


"So," Pierce began, leaning rather nonchalantly against a safety rail, sunglasses resting in the right front pocket of her leather jacket. The bridge the two stood on was a walkway, arched over the busiest street in the entire city. Cars and trucks, even a Gustav or two - one of the only Zoids legal to drive around inside of a town or city - rushed by in both directions beneath them, and above them, the sky was beginning to become a bit cloudy, the first visible sign that it was going to rain the following evening.   
  
"You wanted to talk to me about my dad?" She asked finally, leaning back a bit further on the railing. Her motorcycle, a large Harley-styled cruiser with the ruggedness of an AK-47, sat nearby, parked near the base of the walkway`s right side. Oscar Hameros stood a foot or three to the left, one hand on the railing, the other in one of the pockets of his overalls.   
  
** [**_"I can`t dodge him!"   
  
"He`s coming from above!"   
  
"Shit!"_**]**   
  
"Your father was probably one of the best aerial Zoid pilots I`ve ever met," Oscar began. "His death`s always bugged me a bit... A lot, in fact, especially after my own accident, and now that my own son`s gotten into flying," he continued with a brief sigh. Pierce quirked a brow up.   
  
** [**_The Storm Sworder was fast, the Raynos was faster. One overtook the other in a blur of green and silver at mach three, forming ribbons of exhaust over a mile and a half off the ground. Oscar ground his teeth together, swiftly dodging in a wide barrel roll over six streams of bullets from behind. The Raynos was agile, but the Storm Sworder was more so. Summers had allowed Hameros to overtake him for the sole purpose of dodging up overhead and coming down from above in the moment or two of confusion._**]   
  
** "As you know by now, things ended in our only battle pretty..."   
  
** [**_"**I can`t shake him!**" Oscar finally yelled, resisting the forceful pull of the Wild Eagle at the back of his mind. He would not yield to it, not this time. Another hard roll out of the way, the Storm Sworder blazed by, it`s three melee blades aglow with a fierce orange burn to them, coming dangerously close to slicing the left wing right off of Oscar`s Zoid.   
  
"**SOMEONE HELP ME, DAMN IT!**"   
  
His prayers were answered shortly after as the Storm Sworder moved into a deft turnaround, swinging itself a full 180 degrees to turn back at the Raynos, moving on momentum alone with it`s main engines cut off. Again, it`s claws flipped down to reveal six machine guns primed to fire. Oscar was too panicked to fire back, thinking only to dodge and scoop straight down, moving into a downward loop-de-loop. But no bullets ever came this time.   
  
His prayers were answered.   
  
But not how he wanted them._**]**  
  
"Badly," Oscar concluded after a long pause. Pierce shrugged indifferently, the death of her father had always struck her as a mere accident, she hadn`t really clung to it as much as her mother and sister had. "Well, I spent most of the past few years getting up the guts to try and talk to you, your mom or your sister about it, but I never could. I also spent the past few years looking over records of the battle, and the things that happened before it. Wasn`t an accident."   
  
** [**_"**WHAT THE HELL?!**" Oscar screamed in horror, watching the Storm Sworder`s wings extend out, it`s engines igniting only to explode into three gigantic fireballs.   
  
"**SUMMERS! SUMMERS, COME IN! EJECT! EJECT, YOU BASTARD, GET OUT OF THERE!**"   
  
Michael Summers wouldn`t be ejecting though. He was dead by the time that Oscar had managed to cobble his senses together to start screaming._**]**   
  
"Abbie and my mom already feel that way, you`d be better off telling them," Pierce stated coldly. "They think you, Tauros or Martin were responsible for it, have since the day it all happened. Even Mark`s parents think you three had something to do with it."   
  
"Wasn`t us," Oscar shot back with a shake of the head. "I traced things out from the start to the end, back to a mafia-styled Zoid gang with a leader who had a thing for your mother. Your father apparently broke the guy`s nose in front of some fifty people, he never forgot it, and eventually rigged the aerial part of the match after gambling several million on me making a win. From there, things are hazy, but I eventually found the guy`s name out with some effort."   
  
A pause.   
  
"Dexter Rommel. Late founder of the Rommel Corporation," he stated dryly. Pierce quirked a brow again.   
  
"I don`t think it matters much that you told me," she stated. "Abbie and my mom practically disown me everytime they see me, Dad`s death his them pretty hard." A short pause followed, ended with a smile on Pierce`s part. "Hit them the hardest. Abbie was my father`s little 'junior mechanic,' always running around, trying to be helpful. Wound up with oil and grease smeared on her half the time. She did good though, followed Mom`s footsteps as far as wanting to be a mechanic went, at least until the accident."   
  
"And you?"   
  
"I was born to be a Zoid pilot. My dad and Mark`s parents all wanted to hit Class S, so did I. I got into battling and... Well..."   
  
** [**_"**Battle over! Battle over! The winner is...**"   
  
"Not me," a younger Pierce Summers muttered to herself rather dejectedly, prying open the cockpit hatch of her crashed Pteras and stumbling out dizzily._**]**   
  
"I got my ass kicked. Then I found out that the Backdraft were hosting a pilot training program and made it into the Zabat test squadron," she explained. "My mom found out, she and Abbie disowned me on my nineteenth birthday. Haven`t had the guts to talk with Mom since, and Abbie refuses to speak to me without trying to make me quit, especially now that she knows about my former past with the Backdraft Group. Mark`s cooler about it, he and his parents are almost the only family I`ve got left but his mom and dad are having a bit of trouble speaking to me and staying on good terms with my Mom and Abbie so..."   
  
"So it`s all gone to Hell."   
  
"Pretty much. You should`ve tried to tell them though," she pointed out.   
  
"Your mother refuses to answer my calls, sends my letters back to me and threatened a restraining order when I tried to talk to her face-to-face. Your sister is on vacation and my conscience couldn`t handle the burden anymore," Oscar replied, continuing a second later. "Long as one of you knows, that`s a ton off my back," he finished.   
  
"I can see your point," Pierce replied, straightening up a second later. "Been nice talkin` to ya, but I have a nowhere to get to and I don`t intend to be late," she stated. Oscar nodded. "And my wife`s probably worried sick about me since I left my medication at home."   
  
A pause as the two made to leave.   
  
"One more thing, you single?"   
  
"If you think you`re going to have an affair with m-" "_No_, _no way_," Oscar cut her off, blushing furiously. Quite a sight given how old he was. "I`m too terrified of Maria to do that, don`t you know how insane it is to cheat on a Garamian woman?" He asked. Pierce vacantly nodded. "What then?"   
  
"I know a guy you might want to meet some time, Leon Tauros, if you`re interested."   
  
"I prefer being single, but thanks anyway," Pierce replied, walking off and leaving Oscar alone.   
  
The slightly overweight ex-pilot shrugged and sighed. "I tried, Steve," he mumbled to himself, having made a fairly futile attempt at hooking Tauros` son up with _someone_ who actually seemed relatively similar to him. Not that Leon knew, or would ever agree to the two men trying to set him up with anyone or anything, but still, the boy needed a social life or he was going to burn himself out at thirty.   
  
  
More than a bit solemnly, Jamie Hameros stepped into his room with a low toned yawn, kicking his shoes off and chucking his gloves off to the side. He had spent two days in his normal clothing and hadn`t slept more than four hours during that time. He`d only gotten home two hours earlier and now he was ready to sleep.   
  
At least he hoped he was ready to sleep. In truth, he`d tried to sleep a lot during the past two days, but he couldn`t focus his thoughts enough on something _other_ than the jumble of disoriented thoughts that had been plaguing him for the entire time, ever since Eliza - Leyla`s third and most sophisticated personality - had mentioned something about her being her father`s prize 'specimen.' It had been eating away at him, the revelations of three personalities, the shortlived relief that came with knowing he wasn`t infected with any diseases from all the trists the Wild Eagle had carried out, only to have that bit of relief go nightmarish at the perspective of Leyla being pregnant. Eliza had told him that all the tests were negative, but Jamie Hameros wasn`t exactly someone well known for his confidence in anyone, himself included.   
  
He had also managed to figure out a very crude reasoning behind the names of the two secondary personalities - almost the same reasoning, he felt, that the Wild Eagle had used when coming up with Will E.. To put it simply: Connie was a conwoman, a confidence job professional, it seemed, while Eliza was sheer elegance, maturity and dignity personified. Leyla was just normal, aside from being one of the best Zoid pilots that Jamie had ever seen - at least going by simulators.   
  
With the upcoming match, that was another thing that worried him. Was Leyla good enough to beat the current roster of the Blitz Team with Bit having gone missing-in-action? Or would she turn out to be like Jamie usually was - only good in simulators or at a distance from above? Would she trash Brad and Leena or would Leena and Brad trash her? And what about Jamie himself, where did his loyalties lie in the midst of all of this?   
  
And what of the loyalties of the Wild Eagle?   
  
Jamie knew enough of his obscure alter ego to know that 'Will' happened to have _some_ feeling for all of the others involved in the battle, he wouldn`t be so eager to join in otherwise, right?   
  
It was all confusing, worrying and annoying at once, eventually ending with a simple gesture and an even simpler sentence.   
  
"This. Fucking. _Sucks_," Jamie pointed out in the relative silence of his bedroom, having left the lights off when he had gotten in. A smack to his own forehead and one thump later, the teen had buried his face in between the two pillows on his bed and tried to will himself to sleep.   
  
It was 7:30 PM in the early evening. The sun wasn`t even fully down yet.   
  
  
An hour later, Brad Hunter found himself sitting among familiar, welcome company at a place he`d often frequented during his years 'on the lamb,' so to speak. Few people knew of his dozen or so aliases anymore, among them was the woman presently sitting to his right. Her partner wasn`t present, Leon had always held a good deal of respect for the burgeoning relationship between the two, which made for an odd dynamic between the three of them.   
  
Brad Hunter hadn`t been to the Last Chance Bar since his days as Bart Huntley, just prior to when he`d gotten into Zoid battling alongside another then-unknown rookie pilot by the name of Jack Sisco. Brad had been a fugitive at the time, waiting all of five years for the statute of limitations to run out for the assault and battery of an agent of the Guardian Force, not to mention the theft of a few dozen anti-Zoid rifles.   
  
That was at least two years ago. Maybe it was three now, he`d never been particularly masterful at telling time when it came to anything longer than a month. Tonight though, he sat at the same old stool that had once been his nightly haven, though he was without the customary bottle of vodka he had once downed at least once a night. Beside him sat once Naomi Fluegel, who had apparently been finding her way into a lot of bars and diners lately, mainly since she absolutely _hated_ cooking. Oh, she could cook great, but she _hated_ it with a passion.   
  
"I`m just out of my depth here," Brad finally admitted, resisting the urge to fall into one of his old habits and order the shot of vodka that would kick off the festivities of getting drunk. "Bit`s gone, Leena`s gone nuts again, the Doc is on the too much with Leyon and that Obscura woman to be of any real help and now Jamie`s making me paranoid. To boot, his subconcious is a homicidal lunatic," he added, obviously more than a little on edge.   
  
"Sounds _fun_," Naomi stated sarcastically. Neither of the two were very emotional in how they looked, but then again, they expressed themselves more subtly most of the time anyway. "Where did Bit run off to?"   
  
"That`s just _it_, I don`t know. The guy`s a loose cannon ever since we fought with Kale and my Zoid`s just..."   
  
"Hm?" Naomi thoughtfully glanced at him. "What about it?"   
  
"Ever since I woke up in the cockpit after getting knocked out, I`ve felt a bit uneasy about it. Lately, it`s just been getting worse... And to top things off..." A sigh and a pause. Naomi would`ve asked, but Brad continued before she had the chance. "I heard a voice telling me to avoid using it outside of battles. I`m almost ready to rip the thing apart to see if there`s something actually wrong with it..."   
  
"It`s a machine, Brad. It doesn`t have feelings, it doesn`t want you dead and it can`t go against what you tell it to do," Naomi said with a roll of her eyes. Brad frowned. "That`s exactly what worries me. The Liger seems alive, same with how the Shadow Fox used to be, and Leon`s Liger seems alive too, but the Scout Fox... Just..."   
  
"What? Is there a boogeyman under the chair?" She chided.   
  
"No. Something just feels _wrong_ with it. My gut instinct isn`t ever wrong that often, and right now it`s screaming at me to get rid of the thing."   
  
"It`s a top-of-the-line military Zoid, Brad. It hasn`t even been broken in very much and the model isn`t even mass produced yet, give it some time and things will pan out."   
  
Brad leered sideways to her, but Naomi`s expression was solid, subtly confident and reassuring all at once. He finally gave a nod and sighed out. "You`re right. As usual," he finally ceded, though he never spoke the thoughts to follow.   
  
_ "I hope."   
  
  
_ Thunder struck out in the distance. The terrain was familiar, the same tracks of land surrounding any one of the dozen or so cities, villages and hometowns that dotted the way from Farentown to the Wind Colony. It wasn`t farmland, just flat desert as far as the eye could see.   
  
The normal eye, anyway. For Bit Cloud on the other hand, he could see right through the distance even in the rain in the dead of night. Water beat down across the swaggering form of the Liger Zero, which was keeping at a steady walk rather than a full run. For some reason, Zeke wanted to take his time this go-round. He wouldn`t say why, Bit had asked him repeatedly, but it didn`t really matter.   
  
_ "Think you can lean the seat back?"   
  
Eh?   
  
"I`m tired."   
  
Isn`t it only 10:30?   
  
"Well excuse me, mister '**LEAVE THE GOD DAMNED RADIO OFF OR I`LL EJECT YOU INTO A LIGHTNING BOLT!**'"_ Bit retorted with a snort.   
  
_ ... Bah, fine. _  
  
And with that, the Liger`s radio kicked on, automatically switching to what at first sounded like a symphony, but then took on several guitars. Combined with the sound of the rain and the infrequent burst of thunder, it was enough to lull almost anyone to sleep. The bursts of lightning negated it a bit, but then, Zeke leaned the seat back in a similar way to how the Jaeger system altered the cockpit.   
  
"Much better," Bit commented, tossing his arms behind his head. "`Bout time you got the 'comfort' thing down, buddy," he added.   
  
_ ... I`m not a freaking Lay-Z-Boy, you lousy, blonde headed bum.   
  
_ "Don`t get smart with me," Bit growled.   
  
_ Hard not to, nitwit.   
  
_ "You`re just jealous of the fact that I can actually walk on two feet. You quadrapedic punk ass," Bit fired back.   
  
_ Yes. You can walk on two feet. Now shut up or you will.   
  
_ "... You win."   
  
_ I always win.   
  
_ Bit muttered something under his breath.   
  
**_ WHAT WAS THAT?!   
  
_** "... I uh... I said you had a lot of class. Yeah. That`s it."   
  
_ That`s what I thought.   
  
_ Shortly thereafter, a mutual snicker was shared. The whole thing had been one long joke.   
  
Bit and Zeke had been hanging around each other way too much.   
  
  
_ "Where am I?"_ A lone mind thought.   
  
** I do not know**, a lone Voice stated.   
  
In the ruins of what had been an archaeological dig, two lone figures stood. There was no debris nearby, the Gojulas-H, the two Command Wolves and the Gustav had all just... Wandered off. The Republican crew was completely out of it, at least one had sustained a completely imploded rib cage, two others had been electrocuted at once, the others were all a bit bloody but just unconcious. The remaining equipment had obviously been destroyed, but that aside, nothing had really happened at all.   
  
In the ruins of what had been an archaeological dig, two lone figures stood.   
  
One towered over the other, equal in height to a Geno Saurer, at least twice the length, it stood on four legs, yet only two seemed fit for true usage on the ground. The forelegs were those of a great eagle or falcon, the claws retracted for the moment, while the hind legs were those of a lion, sturdy and powerful. It`s tail matched it`s legs, easily distinguished as that of a lion, save for the fact that the 'hairs' on the puff at the end of it`s tail were each micro-sized razors, and it was covered with hundreds of them. Great wings folded onto it`s back, layered over with feathers of the most reflective silver, miniature thrusters hidden within. Two blades, not onlike those of a Storm Sworder, rested on the front of each wing, undeployed for the time being. It`s head was that of an eagle, eyes a dull blue around an empowered, _awakened_ red, with a beak that curved downward in a right angle at the tip, concealing within a weapon of awesome power. A quick firing beam cannon was placed at the bend of each wing`s middle, with the blades to either side.   
  
It looked so unlike an actual Zoid, almost like a true, living, biological creature, a myth. A real Griffin, but at the same time, it seemed to fill some other role.   
  
It was the Ancient.   
  
It was Roc.   
  
And beneath him stood a figure of near-androgynous appearance, spiked, wild hair settled back to the top of the figure`s shoulderblades, a powerfully limber build. There was almost nothing feminine about the figure, but at the same time, there were a few obviously feminine features to it. A woman`s stride wasn`t one of them. The clothing was ancient, highly basic and a bit odd to look at. It had once been standard military garb for Zoidian soldiers, but not it only barely looked normal. A green tunic shirt layered over a body jumpsuit of some sort of black material. It wasn`t spandex, too loose in fit, nor was it something very similar.   
  
Last about the figure was the gigantic club held in one hand. It would`ve tired out an ordinary man in a matter of minutes to try and lug around, mainly since it was a hundred pounds or more in weight, made of a material that could superconduct electricity with frightening ease.   
  
** It looks as if the world needs us again.   
  
**_ "Who am I?"   
  
_** You are Madison Rose. We are Guardians. Let`s go to work.   
  
** The underside of the huge Zoid, at the chest, slipped open to reveal an inner chamber eerily reminiscent of the cockpit of the Death Stinger, and the woman was soon unwittingly drawn from the ground, not with cords, or anything else. Her club lifted and since she was holding onto it with a near-death grip, she went with it, magnetically drawn within. The chamber slid shut, Madison faltered tiredly into the chair and Roc Spoke again.   
  
** Rest now. It will come to you with time. Rest.   
  
** She was asleep by the time the Voice ceased. Roc`s beak opened with a shrill cry, it`s wings spreading out in full, straight up, before coming to beat down solidly, throwing a plume of dust up from the ground as the beast lifted up, held aloft more by magnetics and guided by it`s wings. Seconds passed by and one of the archaeologists groggily shifted into conciousness in time to see the dust cloud to shatter from the speedy withdrawl of a gigantic silver bolt of energy, lined vaguely with a dark bluish tint.   
  
  
Hundreds of miles to the west, atop a small hill in the dead of night, an elderly lady, dignified to the extreme, sat in silence on the porch to her quaint home, watching the storm clouds gathering in the distance. Her expression was one of thoughtful concern. She sat in a rocking chair, pink-red eyes with no visible pupils shifting ever so slightly from time to time before finally sliding shut, a knowing expression showing through on her aged-yet-beautiful face. Blonde-gray hair held in a lengthy ponytail shifted with the low winds of the evening, a slow, resigned smile forming on her face.   
  
It was the smile of the hopeful, and the smile of the condemned.   
  
"I was wondering if you would come," she finally said to the figure who finally made herself visible from behind, within the shadows.   
  
She was equally aged, her looks equally preserved. Her hair, in contrast, was blue lined with gray, her skin showing a few less wrinkles but her eyes showing a heavier personality. Unlike Fiona, this one`s body was thinner, more petite. In their youth, they had been opposites, in their age, they were almost twinly at times. The figure was clad in an old, blue leather dress that still fit perfectly even after nearly two hundred years of wear and tear, clasped together by a series of belts and rings with a pair of pants and a sleeveless shirt worn underneath. Fur-rimmed boots completed the outfit as Riese took her steps to stand shoulder to shoulder with the very woman she had once sworn to murder in cold blood.   
  
"It seems like the more things change-" "- the more they stay the same," Fiona completed ominously, standing up next to her old... Friend? Perhaps, perhaps not. Two hundred and fifty years of life could render many things obscure. Friendship was among them, but then again, so was hatred.   
  
"It`s almost like yesterday, they-" "- were at each other`s throats. Back then -" "- things were almost the same as they are-" "- now. The world threatens it`s end -" "- and we can only sit back and wait-" "- for the chance to prove that we`re no one`s pawns-" "- anymore," the two said as one, continuing each other`s sentences to the end.   
  
"Black clouds are on the horizon. The ones who can actually block the chaos to come have been split apart across Zi," Riese predicted dryly. "Perhaps, but hope remains," Fiona retorted with the same old optimism in her voice that even staring into the face of the apocalypse couldn`t put out. Riese chuckled dully.   
  
"Still as blind to the obvious end of the world as ever, I see," she commented.   
  
"Better to be a blind fool with hope than a visual prophet with none at all," Fiona retorted again with an equal chuckle.   
  
"The Guardian is awake. They`ll be coming soon," Riese stated, killing the briefly, ironically pleasant mood in an instant. Fiona still smiled though.   
  
"I know," she finally said. Lightning crashed in the distance. Storm clouds were still gathering far away.   
  
  
The privately operated laboratory owned by Doctor Paul Tsun, a man currently standing across from a strange looking operating table, several dozen cords dangling above it, each with a suction cup attached to the end, and each suction cup placed around a small lens of some sort. The cords lead up to a central unit linking them all together to a single cord running over the ceiling to a series of monitors and a printer of some sort at the end of it all, with a currently vacant computer chair settled in front.   
  
The room was well lit, exceptionally clean and kept free of the presence of a certain three or four year old boy by a series of four heavy locks and a number pad with a private code word typed in in an obscure method of substitution. The code number was 20161471. The substitution method was a trick that Tsun had picked up in college, he`d been quite a heavy LAN gamer and had eventually learned to 'speak l33t' as a result of it all.   
  
The door was open for several seconds longer, at which point, a teenaged girl dressed in a black bodysuit stepped within, pushing the door shit behind her. It was a relatively easy task, despite the fact that the door probably weighed thrice as much as her father, who was close to 280 or so pounds. The locks slipped shut automatically, meaning the door could only be opened from within, or the code and key combination had to be put in use on the outside.   
  
"About time," Paul commented paternally, seeming to run through last minute inspections of his equipment.   
  
"Drake wanted me to tell him a bedtime story, then I had to dig up the suit," Leyla explained. "It wasn`t easy, since _someone_ chucked it into my laundry," she grumbled.   
  
"Probably Connie," Paul sighed, drawing a raised brow. "Connie?"   
  
"Oh... No one," Paul answered. He`d learned to not mention Leyla`s other personalities to her, if only because she outright refused to believe they existed. It was a sheer case of denial despite overwhelming evidence, like someone trying to ignore the existence of Roswell even when standing on one of the mindfields in front of it.   
  
"Alright, get on the table and we`ll start the scans," Paul ordered, not needing to watch his adopted daughter haul herself onto the table and lay back, as was the nightly routine. The scanner device started lowering, the numerous cords extending towards their various locations across her head, neck, shoulders and everywhere else. They measured everything from brain waves to body temperature to heart rate to red blood cell count to bone strength in a matter of seconds.   
  
_ "Just as I thought. She`s been stressed too much lately,"_ Paul groaned in thought, looking through the readouts. Leyla was becoming increasingly unstable. That was a very, _very_ bad thing.   
  
  
** Someone`s coming.   
  
**_ "Gee, it`s only a well lit, empty garage where a pin drop is audible from fifty feet away. However did you know?"   
  
_** ... Smartass.   
  
**_ "Better a smartass than a dumbass, yes?"   
  
_** Indeed.   
  
** "Are you Vega Obscura?" A voice echoed from behind, obviously born of the kind of pride inherent to an Imperial army officer. Torson was trying to speak but his voice was muffled. The sounds of a struggle were playing out behind him. Fury rumbled briefly.   
  
"Yes, actually," Vega finally responded, straightening up from the floor and turning around. The bags under his eyes, the messed hair on his head, the posture and the dull smirk all combined to make him seem menacing, even at his extremely young age. It was almost like an encounter from centuries before, when Raven had first spoken to Karl Schubaltz prior to the demolition of a base during the third Guylos-Helic War.   
  
Eerie how history could repeat itself and play a different tune all at once.   
  
"My name is General Otto Schubaltz. I`m here to deputize you for work on the Guardian Force," the man stated, the three soldiers behind him still holding Torson several inches off the ground. Vega shrugged.   
  
"Fine, but if you don`t let go of my pal there, Fury`s going to have to remove you from the face of planet Zi," Vega replied, motioning up to the towering blue Zoid. The Razorwind Fury, it had only been equipped earlier in the evening after repairs had finally been completed, and even off the battlefield it was completely imposing. Otto grunted.   
  
"Put him down," he finally ceded, causing the three soldiers to nonchalantly drop Lars right on his head with a dull thud and a vague crack. "I have two conditions for working for the Guardian Force," Vega began with the skill and diplomacy of an experienced negotiator. Otto raised a brow.   
  
"The first is the deputization of Lars Torson - the guy who`s neck you just about broke, Katherine Takahori and Dana McCallister, along with the possession of the Storm, Berserk and Razorwind armors, as well as the inclusion of both the Fury and the Hammerhead II Foe Hammer," he exclaimed, pulling the name out of nowhere and hoping it wasn`t taken.   
  
"Done. And the second?"   
  
"Release Sarah Obscura from prison, preferably into the supervision and protection of either Stigma Stoller or Steven Tauros," Vega stated, smoothly running through the motions of releasing his mother from prison. If she became a mobile target, it`d be that much harder to track her down, and that much harder for Kale to assassinate her. "You do realize that she`s a known criminal in prison for a good many reasons."   
  
** They want to deputize you for Kale. **  
  
"You do realize that without me, Kale is going to continue mopping the fucking floor with every last god damned task force you throw at him?"   
  
"And if we deputize you anyway?"   
  
"Fury will have all of you with some fava beans. Salted."   
  
The Zoid rumbled threateningly. Otto grimaced.   
  
"Fine. You have one day to report to duty, Guardian Force headquarters on the northern corner of the Guylos-Helic border, I`ll be waiting."   
  
And with that, Schubaltz turned and walked away, the three soldiers following suit a second later as Lars pried himself off the floor in a disgruntled heap.   
  
"Ya didn`t have to get me dragged into this mess too, yanno," he complained, rubbing the back of his unbelievably sore neck with one hand. Vega shrugged.   
  
"I need you and the rest of the team for support. Besides, you guys could use a few days off from Stoller`s crap," he commented. Torson grimaced. All Hell was going to be raining down on Vega if and when Stigma found out.   
  
  
A hotel room. A nice hotel room too, with three actual rooms(a kitchenette set in the living room with a bathroom and a bedroom all adjoined together as well) and a good balcony. It wasn`t a high rise suite, but it _was_ on the waterfront and it was also very nice. The two occupants didn`t much care though.   
  
Abigail Summers and Marcus Harlock lay in bed. Both had just eaten, both were exhausted from an especially long day despite how relaxing it had been and both were fresh out of the bath. Neither was clothed, but that was just a minor detail.   
  
The two were talking idly, of course. Chit-chatting about what they would do tomorrow and how it would happen and so on and so forth, but neither realized that off in the distance, a man was plotting things. Violent things. Maniacal things.   
  
Arihmanes still had his plan, and he was still ruthlessly, psychotically dedicated to seeing it through to the bloodiest possible ending. The man sat alone in his own hotel room, which was actually a run down shack he`d rented under the auspices of 'fishing.' In truth, he was sharpening his knife, biding his time to carry things out as stylishly as possible to impress the woman, sweep her off her feet in grand style, if you will. Of course it was illogical, but for a man who`d had half of his face burned off, logic was beside the point. Reconstructive surgery had done wonders, but he still wore a mask. The difference was that this mask was sprayed on in the morning and snapped off at night.   
  
"Mine. Mine. Mine," he kept repeating to himself. "All mine..."   
  
A picture of a certain green haired, green eyed young woman sat not too far away. Arihmanes was so focused on it that he didn`t even seem to notice the knocks at the door.   
  
Finally the door opened. It was a policeman, someone must`ve noticed that the fishing house lights were on. Despite how he`d come ready for a shoot out, the man never even lived long enough to order Arihmanes to surrender. The watchman for the dock didn`t live long either. With one throw of his knife, Arihmanes had cut open the skull, throat and collar of the policeman and stabbed straight through the nose of the watchman with a sickening spurt of blood from each.   
  
"Sharp enough now," he commented, limberly standing up in a spidery fashion, the picture finding it`s way into his pocket. Steps were taken and within seconds, he crouched over the second dead body, neck shifting about in an unnatural sort of way. His half-mutilated face lacked the plastic half-mask that was usually worn, but his replacement eye - usually covered up by a false lense - shone a dark red light on the knife.   
  
"Sharp enough to cut my precious loose," he added, yanking the longknife out of the face of the second corpse and smearing the blood all over the good side of his face. It wouldn`t be long now.   
  
It wouldn`t be long at all.   
  


_ End Chapter Thirty-Three  
  


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**Author`s Note:** Arihmanes didn`t take getting mangled very well, did he? And now you see how Riese fits into all of this... Was gonna bring her in closer to the end, but it still fit with what I`d had planned, so no biggie.  
  
That`s all for now folks, review, enjoy, Sh33p out and see ya next time!. 


	34. Knife walking

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I do not own Zoids. I do own all the OCs in this story, either by association or actual creation.  
  


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**New Age**  
Knife walking   
  
  
  


The dull blare of an alarm clock. It was dark. The sun hadn`t even come up and the alarm clock was already going off. With an annoyed grunt, driven more by the Wild Eagle than Jamie himself, the teen straightened up, one eye half-shut, the other squinted and blurred with sleep, a sticky, dry feeling from having breathed in humid, cold air through his mouth all night. His ears hurt too, and to top it all off, his nose was almost painfully dry in one nostril, thickly clogged beyond breathing in the second.   
  
"I hate my life," he concluded in an instant, nonchalantly backhanded the alarm clock from above. Normally, he would have bothered noticing the feel of his skin breaking against the bits of metal that made up the frame and circuitry, or the shattered plastic-based imitation of glass that formed the display, but at present, Jamie could have cared less. The alarm clock rang one last time, and didn`t ring again after that. Lazily and tiredly, the youth rose up, wiping away bits of clockwork from his now bruised, semi-cut right hand. The skin had been broken but nothing else.   
  
Slipping on his bedroom shoes, Jamie groggily stepped out of the room with a yawn, staggering down the cold, dark hallway, past Steven`s room, past what had once been Leon`s room, past Leena`s room and past Brad and Bit`s rooms, heading on a byline down the path of the hall. After a short while, he turned to the right, straight into a closed door. A brief stumble back and a following swish of air and metal, and the teen stepped inside, grabbing a plastic cup and pouring himself some tapwater to drink.   
  
_ "Why the hell are we up so god damned early?"_ The Wild Eagle asked in a disgruntled tone, obviously disdainful over having been stirred so abruptly.   
  
"We`ve been sleeping since 7:30 last night, you narcoleptic fuck. Wake up."   
  
_ "... What the hell bit **you** on the ass?"   
  
_ "You. Now shut up or I swear to god I`ll blow our brains out."   
  
The Wild Eagle sounded something rarely indecisive, silencing right afterward. It was especially rare for the two to converse outside of thoughts, even more so for it to happen on the base. It was also rare for the Wild Eagle, naturally more dominant, naturally more confident and naturally more prone to stay through any arguement until he got his way, regardless of whether or not he was right or wrong. For Jamie to win, that meant that the Eagle was either too tired to fight back or genuinely afraid, and neither were exactly common events.   
  
"I hate you," Jamie muttered, throwing a passing glare into his own reflection on the door of the microwave, turning back into the hallway only to pause and step back into the kitchen, glancing at the clock since he`d destroyed his own. It was 5:50 in the morning, he`d slept for ten hours and none of it had been peaceful. A nightmare, perhaps? No. A nightmare would`ve meant at least a vague memory of what the nightmare was about. He hadn`t even dreamt in his sleep. He absently noted now, four minutes after waking up, the facts that his clothes stuck to his body from a cold sweat and his right hand was by now partially covered on the outside with blood. The cuts hadn`t been serious, they`d just been left completely unattended.   
  
He shrugged.   
  
Sipping down the entire cup of water, Jamie continued down the hall, chucking the emptied piece of plastic over his shoulder, unknowingly landing it off a wall and back into the doorway of the kitchen, where the door crushed it in half while closing. The sound of crumpling plastic didn`t even register for him, he had bigger questions in mind, which was even more out of place for him. Jamie was almost obsessively clean, in fact, without him, the base would`ve likely been filled with foot-high piles of trash at least once a week.   
  
Chief among his concerns though, was the situation he faced for a battle set to take place in the late afternoon:   
  
He would have to determine whether his words to Brad were true. Who`s side was Jamie really on, anymore? If you`d asked him the question even two weeks ago, it would`ve solidly been answered with 'The Blitz Team.' A few years before that, it would`ve been 'my friends and family.' But now, the normally timid, pacifistic(when it came to matters outside of official battles) and oftentimes obedient teen was forced to consider the true place where his loyalties were located: With his own interests - a possibly romantic(if difficult) relationship with Leyla, the chance at becoming a freelance battle analyst for any number of news agencies and the possible shot at independence from everyone in his life, both financially and psychologically - or the interests of his team mates - which seemed to offer only a life of what seemed like reliance on just about everyone around him for everything.   
  
And then there were the Wild Eagle`s loyalties. 'Will' had shown himself to be ruthless and homicidal in getting what he wanted, multiple times no less. He`d killed at least a few hundred people, maybe even a thousand in total, and Jamie had yet to get an answer as to how many women that the Eagle had taken unprotected sex with. Contrary to popular belief, unprotected sex wasn`t something that came with no consequences. Jamie didn`t know if there were children out there who had been born of his counterpart`s uninhibited attempt at a secret lifestyle, he didn`t even know how long the Eagle had been lurking around in the back of his subconcious. He`d only _shown_ himself to the others a few times, what if he`d actually been around for far longer?   
  
Entering the bathroom after who knows how long, Jamie finally realized that he had been carrying around a change of clothes gathered at some point in his internal debate. It was his flight outfit, complete with gloves and the lightly made flak vest that fit the requirement of at least one piece of armor for every aerial Zoid pilot. His first suspicions were clear as he pressed the button to shut the bathroom door, firmly remembering to press in the lock in the process. His change of clothes soon found it`s way plopped onto the countertop shared by the sink and a stack of rags. A towel was absently chucked onto them a second later before Jamie started to remove his clothes, sneering angrily all the while.   
  
Finally, his body froze, just as he finished removing his clothing. A change started, but it was fought back. The entire left side of his face shifted to an angle, as if trying to complete a transformation into a different human being. Even the hair to that side of his head shifted, slicking up into one side of a low V, but it couldn`t seem to move past that. Both sides of the teenager`s face contorted into a warped look of wills clashing, both sides assaulting each other for control.   
  
In most cases, the Wild Eagle could have won easily. Jamie was too weary to put up a good fight in his present condition, at least that`s what the Eagle thought.   
  
He was quite wrong.   
  
"Get. Back. Into. Your. Fucking. _Cage_."   
  
"What the hell is your problem?!" The Wild Eagle spat, though most of the sentence came out of the left side of the mouth. No answer.   
  
"I don`t know where your loyalties lie anymore Jamie, but you know you need me," Will grit out, trying to reach the rational side of the other personality`s thoughts. "I`m looking out for both our needs, now give me control or else _I`ll take it from you_!"   
  
"**_SHUT THE HELL UP!_**"   
  
A burst of raw emotion, the left side contorted back to normal in an almost violent manner. Inside of the mental link between the two personalities, what equated to the end of a vicious power struggle saw it`s end - for the moment at least. The image that Jamie saw was of himself yanking out of a test of strength and abruptly belting the Wild Eagle across the side of the face, then promptly slamming a door shut on his skull until blood sprayed across a floor that didn`t exist. It was the psychological equivelent of attempted murder.   
  
A survival mechanism withdrew the Wild Eagle from the fight before Jamie could finish the deed. When the image snapped to reality again, Jamie found himself hunched halfway over the countertop, his gums nearly numbed from how hard his jaw was clamped shut, breathing as if he was hyperventilating, drenched with even more cold sweat than before. Slowly though, his jaw unclenched, lips that had been open in hard, gasping breaths slid shut slowly, neutral at first.   
  
And then they curled into a feral smile. He had been staring at the countertop until then, and when he looked up, almost ready to laugh, he was completely disgusted at the look in his own eyes. Disgusted enough that less than a second later, the lights in the bathroom went out, flipped off for the time being.   
  
Jamie had decided to shower in the dark this time. He couldn`t stand the sight of himself anyway.   
  
  
"Markie! Get the door!" Abbie yelled from the bathroom, even though Mark could hear the banging of the knocks with relative ease compared to her. He grimaced lightly, feeling entirely too comfortable to move at all but after the thirteenth or fourteenth slam into into the door, he changed his mind about being too comfortable to move, if only because it sounded like the pounding on the door threatened to jar it loose from the frame.   
  
Standing up lazily with several scratches to the small of his back, he was comparitively slow to step around the coffee table, hiking up a leg and instead just going over it. Most people would`ve felt at ease getting the door in their pajama pants and a t-shirt, but Mark didn`t. Sure, Garamian culture had a 'who gives a shit?' attitude when it came to people walking around in odd clothing(it was almost normal to see people waltzing around in their underwear during the middle of the day at summer), but Mark wasn`t Garamian. He still had his modesty.   
  
And his sarcasm.   
  
And the fact that he was a semi-cranky bastard every other morning.   
  
"I`m coming, damn it," he grumbled at the door, finally stepping up to it and glancing into the peephole. A man stood there, at the edge, only his back visible. "What`s this?"   
  
"Room service."   
  
"I didn`t order room service..."   
  
"Complimentary deal."   
  
That made sense. Stepping back and unlocking the door, the pilot lazily pried it open a second later. There was no one in sight.   
  
Slowly, Mark poked his head out of the room, and it was only the fact that he looked to the right first that saved his life. Most people tend to look left first, it was a little known fact because so few people actually paid attention to it. Assassins were among the people that did.   
  
With a jerk and a yell of surprise, Marcus stumbled back out of the way, narrowly avoiding decapitation at the forward curved blade of a familiar longknife. Arihmanes` Khukri.   
  
On a knee-jerk reflex, he threw the door shut and gained all of a quarter of a second to gather his thoughts into a vague jumble resembling coherency, a period of time just long enough to realize just what he`d dodged, and what it meant.   
  
"_Shit_!"   
  
"Mark?! What`s going on?!" Abbie yelled from the bathroom, sounding as if she was about to come and see. By the time her words had finished registering though, the door`s hinges and the locking mechanism had been taken out in two swift cuts, gouging the tip of the knife into Mark`s view for a fraction of a second each time. There was a loud thud and the door toppled over, a dead body now laying atop it with Arihmanes standing in the hallway, plainly in sight.   
  
"Can`t you have the decency to at _least_ bleed to death when someone blows half your face off?!" Mark demanded, his sarcasm coming as just about the only thing he could think to carry out. Arihmanes twitched several times in a row.   
  
"A little more than half, actually," he stated with an unusually casual, matter-of-fact way to his voice, his functioning eyebrow twitching with the words. "Shit, I liked you better with the mask," Mark grumbled out, still relying on his sarcasm to give him a second or three more to try and gather his thoughts.   
  
Arihmanes wasn`t going to give him that time.   
  
A lunge forward, Mark jumped back instinctively and stumbled right over the coffee table, perhaps the only thing that saved his life was the fall that followed. Arihmanes made two slashing cuts as this happened, the first being the one that Mark jumped to try to avoid, the second being the one that the fall had saved him from.   
  
The knife turned into a half-blurred circle for a split second, and Mark threw his legs up, catching Arihmanes` wrist and kicking him in the gut. The coffee table broke between their combined weight and the assassin went onto his back with a flip over his would-be target, who had mistakenly failed to try and disarm him in the process.   
  
Mark was on his feet with the speed of a man fighting for his own survival, Arihmanes was on his feet with the speed of a murderous demon from Hell intent on ending that survival, and as the two paused for an instant, Arihmanes` cybernetic eye glowed a disturbed red.   
  
"You took my face," the assassin growled. "Today," a pause, he shifted forward, turning broadside to Marcus with the part of his face that wasn`t mutilated hidden from view. "_**I TAKE YOUR LIFE!**_"   
  
A swift throw, a panicked dodge and a dropkick. It had all happened in the course of a second. Arihmanes had thrown his knife for Harlock`s face, the other had ducked to the left in a frantic motion and the assassin had taken full advantage, practically flying forward and planting one foot into the other`s chest, his second foot finding it`s way into Mark`s stomach.   
  
The black haired pilot toppled over backwards, rolling away not from instinct or skill - both of which he lacked - but from the sheer force of the two attacks, even as Arihmanes landed with the grace and poise of an acrobatic gymnast, swinging down from his one handed landing and skidding along on the floor to the very wall that his knife had lodged in. By the time Marcus was even halfway back to his feet, Arihmanes had torn his knife loose, charging forward with even more speed than before.   
  
This time, like the others, Mark wasn`t ready for him, but even with that disadvantage, he was able to catch Arihmanes` slash by the wrist and flip him over again from his own momentum, right over the countertop and into the kitchenette. The assassin slammed violently into the second countertop, his legs smashing into the cabinets above and upper body contorting disturbingly in the middle of the impact. His free hand again came into play as it had during his first landing, rooting himself to the edge of the countertop and then shoving him upright with a breakdancer-styled spin, landing on both feet. Again, the knife went flying, and again, Mark made a panicked dodge.   
  
Arihmanes tried for the dropkick again, Mark twisted out of the way, dodging the legs but falling victim to a punch across the cheekbone in the process. Even harder, he spun out from the impact, landing on his stomach with a groan of pain, this time though, it was pain he couldn`t ignore. While it was true that Mark had built up an excessively high pain tolerance through the years, for various reasons, it was also true that he needed to actually expect an event to ignore the pain it caused.   
  
He hadn`t expected this _at all_, and as a result, he was hurting like hell and then some.   
  
Arihmanes again landed with an acrobatic swiftness, skidding along the carpet on one hand and both feet. He came to a stop, as intended, at the wall, springing upright and literally tearing his knife from the wall once more, just as the bathroom door yanked open.   
  
"What the hell is going on out here?!" Abbie demanded, causing Arihmanes to pause in mid-step, shifting an obsessive glance her way. It made the young woman`s blood curdle, inspiring a mixture of fear, disgust and concern, the last of which was reserved for Marcus.   
  
"Just helping you dump some garbage, honey," Arihmanes finally stated after several seconds, turning towards her completely and thus exposing the half of his face that hadn`t been burned, bringing even more fear and disgust in the process. "I know you! You`re Aram!" She exclaimed instantly, remembering all too well that sickeningly benign smile of his. It was made again, too, even more disturbing this time.   
  
"Don`t worry love, we`ll be together soon," he stated with a lunatic calm, only to yell out in surprise when Mark literally rammed back into the thick of things -   
  
"No way, no how, no chance, in **_HELL!_** is that happening while I`m around ya fuckin` _gnomish pinko pixie-assed psychopath_!"   
  
- slamming his entire body into Arihmanes` chest, shoulder first. The two crashed into into the ground with the assassin taking the full brunt of the impact, followed by a punch to the burnt side of his face. Any normal man would have either screamed in agony or at least tried to defend himself, Arihmanes only laughed, the surface nerves in that side of his face almost burned away to the extent that he could only blink and make expressions anymore, never actually feeling them when he did so.   
  
Mark`s attack stopped at that punch though, as the butt of Arihmanes` free palm smashed into his chin and threw him back, the assassin`s feet finding their way to his armpits and shoving him off completely, driving him into the floor at the same time. Mark rolled away again, Abbie yelled out a curse and grabbed the nearest heavy object, flinging it at the downed assassin. Arihmanes almost effortlessly sliced the clock in two, the sheer force of the cut throwing the the two pieces over him.   
  
He was back on his feet almost instantly, charging at Mark with the knife held back to make another vicious lunge.   
  
He never finished it.   
  
About half of the coffee table`s remains ensured that much, jetting up and almost sinking into the assassin`s crotch, the result of Mark playing possum and deciding to fight dirty. It followed the simple logic adhered to by any person in a life-or-death battle: If you can`t beat `em, cheat.   
  
Arihmanes stumbled back in pain, his grip on the knife tightening until blood started to drizzle from his palm, Mark`s arms slamming into a pair of uncoordinated punches across his upper back, his knee crashing into the top of the back of one of the assassin`s thighs. Arihmanes stumbled some more, then fell forward when Mark harshly kicked him right in the rear end, sending him to his face as a result.   
  
The former `Staver wheezed exhaustedly, stepping back and then jumping forward, landing with a pair of stomps on the small of his would-be killer`s back before walking forward, leaned against the sliding glass door that lead to the balcony.   
  
Abbie was still too frantic to do anything other than to try and call staff, the police, anyone who could come and help to even try to be remotely calm. Arihmanes though, seemed relatively unconcious, but still alive.   
  
At least he seemed unconcious. Mark was again saved by the fluke of turning around a second too early, reflexively ducking under the assassin and this time twisting out of the way completely. Arihmanes flew over him, crashed through the glass and went diving over the edge of the balcony with an angry scream.   
  
"Fucking _psycho_," Marcus finally managed to gasp out, ducking onto the balcony as Abbie darted back into the room, phone in hand.   
  
"- Hejustjumpedoutawindow, I think," she said, so frantic that her words almost blended together as one every few seconds.   
  
Arihmanes on the other hand, was more determined than most sane people, probably since he wasn`t one of them. The cord wrapped like a leather belt around his free hand snapped loose, revealing a pressure activated grappling line from within, which was promptly cast back to the very safety rail that Mark was leaning over.   
  
"**_SHE`S MINE!!!_**" Arihmanes declared, recoiling back towards the balcony and catching Marcus completely unprepared, locking his legs around the former trucker`s waist and dragging him up from the room, letting their combined momentum carry them up even further than before, though Mark was struggling to hold Arihmanes` knife hand back the entire time.   
  
They came to a dead stop after a few seconds, turning upside down as the cable reached it`s limit, some eighty feet from the balcony, four floors from the top of the hotel.   
  
"Bye, bye."   
  
"Oh, fuck you..."   
  
At this, Arihmanes stopped trying to hold Mark in place, starting a spin of his knife at the same time. Reflexively, Mark let go of his hand, and Arihmanes let go with his legs, throwing the trucker up another forty feet from what was left of their earlier momentum, one hand barely catching a grip on a flagpole that chancingly extended from the side of the top of the building. It bent badly, snapping in two after a second or so, but it had served it`s purpose, swinging Marcus up onto the roof with an agonizing roll along the gravel to the smooth concrete, the snapped flagpole still in hand.   
  
He was bleeding all over, he was hurting, he didn`t know if he had any broken bones and his head was spinning furiously, but he was alive. The real question now was what Arihmanes would do next; Go for Abbie or try and finish him.   
  
"I am _so_ tired of this shit," he groaned out in pain, sitting up and trying to determine the answer to that question almost an instant later. He wouldn`t have to wait long.   
  
With a loud screech of tortured cord, Arihmanes swung up into view, as graceful as ever. His black pants and the loose fitting long sleeved shirt flowing in the winds, the blonde headed assassin started to descend rapidly, Khukri held high to make the killing blow.   
  
"I fucking _**HATE PEOPLE WHO CAN`T TAKE A HINT!**_" Mark screamed irately, taking advantage of the fact that Arihmanes couldn`t twist out of the way at his current speed. The young man merely side stepped out of the way, winding the flagpole up like a Louisville slugger and speaking again.   
  
"**_I DON`T WANT YOUR GOD DAMN GIRLSCOUT COOKIES, NOW FUCK OFF!!!_**"   
  
And with that, Arihmanes came right into striking distance, making a frantic attempt at attacking to his left, failed since he could only use his right arm at the moment. Because of the mistake, Mark sent him flying into another world with one swift ***THWACK*** between the eyes with the broadside of what had been a flagpole, the cloth having been shredded and torn off at some point during his roll along the gravel.   
  
Arihmanes didn`t even scream as his face completely caved in across his eyes and the bridge of his nose, bone cracking like a flimsy piece of wood in a hurricane, though Mark was almost yanked right off of his feet, and the flagpole _was_ torn from his grasp, leaving a shallow cut in his palm in the process. Arihmanes` body landed on the ground with none of the grace it`d shown before, his knife tumbling loose along the gravel and the line he`d used to move around so acrobatically seeming to try and drag him back but failing miserably now that his body`s momentum had completely stopped.   
  
"That clear enough for ya?" Mark asked dizzily before collapsing into a jumbled heap on his knees, breathing hard and utterly exhausted. In just five minutes - at most - a wonderful trip to Garamos Island had turned into the vacation from hell.   
  
  
_** Finished... **_  
  
Crackles of sound, like shattering glass, filled a half-empty hangar within a specific green Whale King, high in the stratosphere. The crackles were of an energy stasis field collapsing, one that looked like a perfectly angled pyramid of a neon blue and blood red mixture in color, with each corner lined in black. Bits of what looked like energy continued falling, landing on the hangar floor and evaporating instantly in puffs of colored smoke, eventually revealing the result of days of toil and effort, not from just one Organoid, but two.   
  
Spectacle appeared like a demon from a flash of green, standing beside the one he considered a partner. He was unphased by the strain it took to force an evolution, mainly since he was one of the more powerful known Organoids, and he had also only bee working in the supplemental role. This time.   
  
_ The whelp is stronger than I thought.   
  
_ A flash of blue and red, Borealis dizzily towered over Bill Chapman for all of a second, then fell forward onto his stomach in what could only be described as the Organoid equivelent of exhaustion. The former-Royal Cup champion said nothing, only trying to use his emotions to comfort the downed Organoid, unable to even pet the creature since his hands were bound together with ten pound shackles held tight by a three pound chain. The collar around his neck had yet to be triggered, he was smarter than to get himself killed, but the expression on his face could only be described as raw contempt.   
  
Bill Chapman was more like Bit Cloud than either of them knew. Both enjoyed one thing above almost all others: Freedom. Freedom to be a lazy slob, freedom to eat too much, freedom to use all the hot water when showering, freedom to blare music so loud that it made people`s ears bleed, freedom to go where, do what and live how they wanted.   
  
Vilhelm Rommel had stripped him of that freedom in a matter of seconds.   
  
Bill Chapman was more like Bit Cloud than either of them knew.   
  
Bit Cloud was a distorted mirror image of what Kale Obscura had turned into mere months earlier.   
  
Kale Obscura was what Bill Chapman was slowly becoming now, held in chains with a bomb attached to his neck and a stungun practically laid out on the base of his skull.   
  
_ "We`ll be out of this soon,"_ he promised to Borealis, meaning it more than almost any other promise he`d ever made in his life.   
  
For the time being though, Bill sat down next to the fallen Organoid, shifting his eyes malignantly over to Vilhelm, who was too busy observing something else to notice. Guards clustered around the captured pair, Spectacle flicked his tail absently and almost made the mental equivelent of a dulled laugh at Chapman`s threatening glares.   
  
**_ I`m... Needed. Elsewhere. The Call echoes again...   
  
_** Bill leered down at the Organoid.   
  
_ "Eh?"   
  
_ Borealis struggled to get his feet shifted forward, laying like a dog now, rather than an unconscious dinosaur. The Organoid didn`t answer though, it`s blue eye focusing in on Bill vaguely before dimming as if it had passed out.   
  
Vilhelm on the other hand, was oblivious to the conversation. He wouldn`t have heard it anyway, telepathy wasn`t exactly a common trait among humans and he valued his own safety far too much to go through sensory modification surgery to get them. The only Organoid that he could speak with was Spectacle, because the two were Bound to each other, and Spectacle was too amused to do anything about it.   
  
For now.   
  
"I always wondered what one would look like," Vilhelm finally admitted with a curious interest in the Zoid before him. "I can`t help but to say that I`m impressed," he said with a mocking, ruthless smile.   
  
The Zoid before him was like a blast from the past with a few new twists and turns. It`s optics were blue by nature, rather than the red associated with the Zoid it was modeled on. Power practically dripped from every inch of it, and despite it`s bulk, it could easily be told that this was a fast Zoid, perhaps able to keep pace with the Berserk Fury so long as it had an Organoid to even the odds.   
  
For Vilhelm, this was only a small piece in the chess board of his plans, the equivelent of a Knight, useful but still expendable in the long run.   
  
The Zoid in question was the same type of Zoid that had put the world on notice centuries earlier, now threatening for a repeat of it`s infamy and legend.   
  
It was a Geno Breaker. Blue, instead of red or even black.   
  
It was also the initial can of gasoline that Vilhelm was going to douse the world with and set ablaze.   
  
  
In a room on a vehicle that had once served as a presidential transport in long-gone, and mostly forgotten times, a man was sitting alone. Most of the lights were off in this room, aside from one lamp that dimly lit a desk. The only other light was provided from the screen of a desktop computer, a custom built one no less. Not only that, but this custom, _civilian_ rig was as powerful as most Guardian Force computers that cost fifty times as much, required maintenance into the extreme, daily reboots and several dozen top secret anti-virus programs per computer to remain in functioning order.   
  
In comparison, this one`s programming was so complex that no modern computer virus of any kind could even crack it`s surface workings.   
  
On the unused side of the desk sat several things. A perfectly stacked tower of empty soft drink cans, a half-empty beer mug currently containing a random grape flavored soda and three plates with nothing but leftover crumbs on them, and on the opposite end from those, nearer the lamp, sat two CD holders, one of which was open and empty.   
  
The man was sitting in his pajamas, he was typing.   
  


** //Access Code required:   
**5K-0310-PX-BDGP1A ****  
//Access Code accepted.   
//Please state username...   


  
Here was the toughy, no one had warned him about a username...   
  


Harvey  


** //Improper username.  
//Please try again...  
** Stigma Stoller  
** //Improper username.  
//Please try again...  
** Wicked Visor Dude  
** //Improper username.  
//Please try again...  
  
**_ "Ah! I know..."   
  
_

Pong0rtehl33t  


** //Username valid.  
//Accessing infromation...  
//Access granted.  
//The Five Kings Program:  
  
//The Backdraft Group`s first stable attempt at raising pilots capable of taking on Guardian Force-level elites and winning. Replacement for the failed Checkmate Project(Now designated BDGP1-FP), designed around the five most promising candidates from the Zoid Educational Simulator Training units(1-5): Kale Obscura(Group 1, age 7 upon entry, age 19 upon disappearance), Vega Obscura(Group 2, age 2 upon entry, age 11 as of last entree), Rayth Takahori(Group 3, age 9 upon entry, age 21 upon disappearance), Randal Clark(Group 4, age 12 upon entry, age 16 at death), Alfred Torson(Group 5, age 13 upon entry, age 22 upon death).   
  
//Tests show an extremely high aptitude for combat training in all fields for all test subjects. Each have been trained in a minimum of two forms of hand to hand combat, and one form of using every weapon commonly available. Vega Obscura(King 2) displays the highest natural ability for Zoid piloting, followed by Kale Obscura(King 1).   
  
**_ "This is all stuff that I already I know,"_ he thought annoyedly, spotting a piece of information that finally caught his eye sometime later.   
  
** //All subjects show a naturally high tolerance for pain and prolonged fighting. Kale Obscura and Rayth Takahori are the best of the group, followed by Alfred Torson and Randal Clark. Vega Obscura shows promise but is still too young to accurately gauge.   
**  
_ "Hmmm..."   
  
_ He skipped ahead again. Nothing he didn`t already know. No advantages, no disadvantages, it was all information rehashed that he already knew, and he didn`t have the energy to peek through the psychological profiles. At least he thought he didn`t, but then the caffine started to kick in...   
  
Focused, he accessed Kale`s profile.   
  
** //Subject: Kale Obscura  
//Age: 19  
//Height: 6'1"  
//Weight: 160 lbs  
//Date of Birth: February 29th, CC 381  
//Known Talents: Subject shows an innate ability to 'read' his opponent`s next moves, even when never having seen said-opponent. Possible telepath. Note the presence, also, of 6.25% unknown DNA. Similar anomaly located within younger brother, Vega Obscura(6.25%), and mother, Sarah Obscura(12.50%).  
//Psychological Profile: Subject was once relatively cheerful, laid back and semi-humorous at times. Held a natural empathy for the Zoids seen in use during the deathmatches, though cared very little for the pilots. Subject also notably protective of younger brother. At present, subject is showing severe signs of mental trauma from an overdose of battle stress, along with the recent death of Alfred Torson and the vanishing of Rayth Takahori. Believed to have started with the removal of Stigma Stoller from the Five Kings Program. Shows rare signs of murderous bouts of anger. Also shows severe signs of contempt for his mother(Sarah Obscura), as well as other sources of authority.  
//Related\Supplemental: Attempted murder of Backdraft Overseer, Altiel Vernon, attempted murder of Major Palta. Death threats made to the Count.  
//Subject also shows signs of inherent mental instability. Should be considered highly dangerous, but has displayed one minor weakness in the past: His younger brother, Vega. Whether or not the weakness remains in his current state is unknown. Subject vanished before any attempt at discovering this could be made.   
  
** "So, this is what makes you tick, you little bastard," Steven Tauros mumbled to himself with determination, eyes narrowing as he scrolled down and began to read into Kale`s past for any other possible chinks in the killing machine`s armor.   
  
  
The Thunder Team base, located just a few dozen miles from a city on the exact opposite end of the the neutral zone that served as ZBC territory. At present, everyone inside was still trying to figure out what to do with the recent loss of Bill Chapman. Even Sloan Tendro, easily the equal of Steven Tauros and Leyon Martin when it came to figuring things out, was completely clueless.   
  
The problem was that the Thunder Team wasn`t going to have the time to make up their minds, because the base was being targeted from low orbit by a passing Judge Satellite. It would be passed off as a complete fluke mistake in the firing systems, providing the opening blow in the media to order the decomissioning of the orbital weapons platforms that were currently the only things capable of hitting anywhere on Zi at almost anytime, and at the very least, leave the orbitals down for several days as crews sought to figure out what went wrong.   
  
In short: The Thunder Team had unknowingly been designated as the sacrificial pawns on the world`s chess board.   
  
A second passed. There was a white glow in the sky, followed by an intense shriek of tortured atmosphere as an orbital strike-level charged particle beam tore through the cloudless heavens, stabbing into the very top of the base, blowing through the roof and gouging straight into the main hangar, where an unwitting Jeffrey Halsworth met his end in utter shock, not even having the time to let out a scream of surprised horror, or even fully register the emotion that the end of his life would have caused.   
  
The rest of the base went out in the hundredths of a second that followed. The attack had been so quick and so fierce that the beam had literally burnt the atmosphere around the base into a vaccum, delaying the sound of the explosion for several seconds and leaving only an eerie, windswept silence to play out to the visual of a sub-nuclear explosion visible from a mile or more away.   
  
Hundreds upon hundreds of miles away, in Nyx, a hacker elite turned around and shouted the news up to his commanding officer. What was to be considered the first shot by the Rommel organization had just been fired.   
  
The second shot wasn`t too long after that. It was the shot that killed the hacker. He`d only been working under a threat of death after all, and if he had outlived his usefulness, why bother keeping him around?   
  
  
In a hangar, situated miles off the ground, in the belly of the great Whale King Foxchild, Bill Chapman winced involuntarily, glancing in the direction of the explosion. He hadn`t heard it, he hadn`t felt it, hadn`t seen it and hadn`t been informed of it. He just _knew_. He _knew_ that the lives of four people had just been ended in a singular fireball and he _knew_ that he would be joining them if he made even one mistake too many.   
  
_ "I`m sorry I let you down,"_ he thought dimly to his newly departed team mates, holding his head down and leaning back against the support for the safety rail that bordered the wall-mounted catwalk from a twenty-five foot drop to the level of the hangar that the Geno Breaker was standing on. Borealis didn`t reply.   
  
**_ The Call...   
  
_** At least, he didn`t reply to Bill, anyway.   
  
  
"Are you Harabec Davids?" A militaristic voice asked as the 46 year old ex-champion leered over his shoulder, a brow arching up as he saw the four men standing rather intimidatingly across the counter from him. It had caused a slight scene, several people were watching now. Most were giving passive glances, a few others were watching with nothing short of a cold sweat. The men were in fully military uniforms, the symbol of the Guardian Force emblazened into the shoulder patches of every one of them. The leader was obviously a high ranking Major, probably Imperial since it was custom for Imperial officers to carry their swords with them whenever they were in full uniform.   
  
"That`s the name, don`t wear it out," he replied finally, putting down the glass mug he`d been about to fill.   
  
"I am Major Conrad Robertson, with the Guardian Force. I`ve been sent here to deputize you into the Force for the specific purpose of stopping Kale Obscura," the Major stated. Harabec`s brow rose slightly. "That snot nosed punk is still causing trouble?"   
  
"He`s been personally responsable for the deaths of at least five to ten thousand people," Conrad answered. "All of them borderzone patrol officers, Guardian Force task force members, former members of the Backdraft Group and convicted prisoners and their guards."   
  
"Point?"   
  
"The point is that you`re the only one who`s been shown to have the power to actually _stop_ him," Conrad answered. Harabec shook his head.   
  
"I beat Kale Obscura so easily the last time because I had the element of surprise, wouldn`t be so easy now. There`s also that minor technicality that he has an Organoid now," he explained plainly. "And until he starts slaughtering civilians, I have no reason to go after him again."   
  
"Then I`m going to have to draft you."   
  
"Won`t work," Harabec stated, halting the movements of three of the four men instantly. "You`re all Imperial officers trying to draft in an unwilling _Republican_-born, neutral citizen," he explained bluntly. "Now, I don`t know too much `bout military procedures, but I do know my rights."   
  
"This borders on treason," Conrad growled. "Treason? Hardly. I may be Republican by birth but I`m neutral by law, and the only law I have to answer to is the local authorities, _not_ you."   
  
"Guardian Force authority supercedes any local government."   
  
"Sure it does, in times of open, active warfare. Last I checked, that ain`t the case."   
  
Silence. The two exchanged a staredown, the intense Robertson trying in vain to intimidate the older man. He lost miserably.   
  
"Very well then, I`ll just come back later with local authority to draft you, if that`s how you feel."   
  
"Fine by me," Harabec shrugged, turning back to his business as the four men left without another word.   
  
Most would`ve mistaken his actions for cowardice, but in truth, the reasons were far more complex. Farentown was one of the two largest, most populous places in the neutral zone, outranked only by Romeo City in the northwest. A population of close to two million, and it had no military defense, nor were there any quick response units nearby. Bandits weren`t entirely uncommon, but with things starting to heat up all over the world, Farentown stuck out like a sore thumb.   
  
Harabec was currently the only person in the city who actually owned a combat Zoid other than the police. If any attacks came to the town, he was going to be there regardless.   
  
  
Brad snuffed his cigarette out, and Leena cracked her neck to either side. Jamie was as silent as he had been throughout the majority of the day, and it had been roughly an hour since the lot had set out from the Blitz Team`s base. All three had launched without any of the usual banter, nor did they have any sort of strategy for the match. Jamie hadn`t spoken enough to even bring up the possibility of creating a strategy for the team to use, and Brad had made quite sure that Leena wasn`t really counting on the other teen`s assistance. Brad sure wasn`t, thus there wasn`t much of a point for Leena to, either.   
  
A loud blast of super heated air filled a small space somewhere off in the distance, just out of sight. How far off, only Jamie actually knew - he was the only one high enough from the battlefield to actually see everything on it.   
  
Across from the team stood a lone Zoid. It was about the same size as the Liger Zero, the same color scheme as well, bar it`s shape and a few other differences. It`s stabilizer 'caps' were colored a light blue-green, it`s white armor covered more of the body, it`s claws and teeth were silver rather than gold, and it was obviously a Zoid based off the frame of the Command Wolf, evidenced by the two smoke canister launch units on it`s back legs. A double sniper rifle was folded in half on it`s back, and a visor unit obviously intended for a combination of cockpit protection and optics enhancement was folded behind the ears, waiting for use. There were also a pair of blades extending down from the collar, sharp and just outside of the range of movement of the head, easily useful for discouraging an enemy in trying to run up under the Zoid.   
  
It was a Konig Wolf, one of the rarer Zoids in use on the tournament circuits. Behind it sat a Gustav, towing two trailers - one latched to a container that had been adapted into a mobile home-away-from-home type of thing.   
  
"I was wondering when you guys`d show up," Leyla`s voice finally came in. "What took ya so long?"   
  
"Traffic`s a bitch," Brad commented.   
  
"What he said," Leena added with a dry tone. The Gunsniper skiddishly stepped up to the Scout Fox, standing next to it with no further exchange made. The Konig Wolf`s mere presence was intimidating for Leena, it`s pilot even more so. After all, she still had to deal with her own vanity, and Leyla already _sounded_ prettier than she did, how much better did she look as well?   
  
Such a relatively petty concern was far from the minds of both Leyla and Jamie though, all five of them. Leyla herself was paying more attention to the green blur overhead, and Jamie had yet to even give a hello, just circling up over the battlefield without a word.   
  
For a girl who had already been stressed out over the prospect of battling a guy who had basically become her first boyfriend, her best friend and several other things(mainly due to Connie and Will`s little trist), his silence was almost enough to drive her mad. As it stood, that potential madness was averted at the last second as a fairly dreary, stress-worn voice sounded off over the comm.   
  
"Hey. Good luck."   
  
"You too," Leyla replied, matching Jamie`s tone almost perfectly.   
  
** "The area within a five mile radius is a designated Zoid Battlefield. This zone is now restricted. Only competitors and personnel have authorized entry. Danger! All others must leave the area at once. Area scanned. Battlefield set up. The Blitz Team versus the Tsun Team. Battle Mode 0982. Ready..."**  
  
Tension filled the battlefield. Seconds passed in an eternity as the four combatants set their sights on their respective targets.   
  
At least, three of them did.   
  
Up in the sky with a bird`s eye view, Jamie was completely unsure of who to aim for. Thus he didn`t set his sights on anyone. There was an eerie silence in his thoughts, the usual background chatter of the Wild Eagle`s voice missing entirely. Had the alter ego finally ceded? Jamie didn`t feel different...   
  
Aside from the growing sense of disgust for himself and mistrust of his own instincts, but that really wasn`t the point. His loyalties had yet to be decided, but now was the time to make his choice.   
  
No one noticed the black speck in the distance.   
  
Rayth Takahori had come to make good on his assignment.   
  
** "_FIGHT!_"   
  
**

_ End Chapter Thirty-Three  
  


* * *

  
  
_

**Author`s Note:** Ahhh! Cliffhanger! :P Sorry if it seemed a bit rough towards the end, I ran into some **major** freaking writer`s block. And if the scene changes are rough(aka the breaks don`t work), blame FF.net and it`s current habit of screwing up my HTML.  
  
**EndlessAdventure:** It`s cool. Not everyone has no social life like me, after all :P And yes, Mark and Abbie had quite the rude awakening, huh? Hopefully I`ll be able to build her character some more soon, she`s one of the people who have a fairly important role to play in the coming story. Glad to see how well received the Pierce and Oscar scene was... And to be honest: I actually did/am toying with the idea of tossing Pierce and Leon at each other. It`s one of the few couples that hasn`t been tried in anything I`ve seen so far >_>; And I **was** considering the idea of sticking Tauros and Sarah together, but decided against it. If such a thing **does** happen, it`ll only be lead into in NA/ROC(the next story`s initials, in case you`re wondering), not actually played out.  
  
**DJ Wolfwood:** No need to apologize for anything o_O; Don`t see how you thought I`d be offended, really... *Tosses a cookie to DJ Wolfwood. One of the 8521735821758275210870954284765298717654127561512837564875168735618354645135135+infinity cookies that ZeonReborn has bombed me with.* :P  
  
**jad101:** Glad you approve.  
  
**Illidan:** Yes. I`m quite evil. So evil in fact that I`m cliffhanging you people. Brutally. And I don`t mean this chapter. *Mwahahahahaha* Just ask Zinou, I can be downright 3v1l l33t, more so than The Great Teacher Largo >_> As for Mark and Kyle... Expect more comedy from them when they see each other again, expect more brutality between Vega and Kale, expect serious development for Bit, Leon and just about everyone else, **and** expect Jamie`s embarrassment and bewilderment to stop being so quaint. This chapter was only the beginning of what I have intended for him...  
  
*Provides a nice cushiony pillow. Then resumes writing.*   
  
And for anyone curious, ROC is not the name of Roc. It`s the initials of the next story, which I sha`n`t name until I`ve driven you all sufficiently insane. And if you **do** figure it out, don`t say it in a review. I`m kinda proud of having found a name untaken in the Zoids section...  
  
That`s all for now folks. Expect the next chapter to be out when it`s finished, which may be anywhere from a few days to a week or two, or longer. But it won`t be months. I hate when authors take months on end to churn out a single chapter. *Twitch.*  
  
Review, enjoy, see ya next time and Sh33p out.  
  



	35. In The End

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I do not own Zoids.  
  


* * *

  
  
**

New Age

**  
_In The End   
  
  
  
It starts with   
  
****_ "_FIGHT!_"   
  
_ One thing, I don't know why   
  
_ Time has a way of slowing down when you don`t want it to, speeding up when you want to relax and enjoy the moment and absolutely halting for miniature eternities at the worst moments possible. Time is not a very nice thing, and this was something that Jamie Hameros was learning firsthand from several thousand feet up in the air.   
  
It was dead silent for once. His ears weren`t even registering the sound of the engine, his eyes were deadlocked to the scene about to play out on the ground below and his thoughts were his own. The Wild Eagle had yet to appear again, Jamie wondered if he had killed the other personality somehow, or if he was just lying in wait for the opportunity to strike back. Either way, it scarcely seemed to matter at the moment.   
  
Finally, his deafened thoughts were broken from their nothingness as the sound of gunfire shot through the skies and the terrain below.   
  
The fighting had begun.   
  
_ It doesn't even matter how hard you try   
  
_ At first, Brad figured that things were even. Leyla was unpredictable, yes, but she wasn`t invincible. The Konig Wolf was tough, it was easily as durable as the Liger Zero`s base armor configuration, probably more so. It`s weapons were slow firing compared to the guns on the Fox and the Gunsniper, and the Scout Fox was easily faster and more agile by far. Unfortunately, she was also as skilled as Bit.   
  
The Brad uncovered this fact a few seconds into the battle. He didn`t like learning about this fact, but he did anyway. This was mainly because the Scout Fox made one miss-step and the Konig was all over them both, tagging the smaller Zoid across the side with both guns after swinging it`s rifles forward, then clamping it`s jaws shut around the Fox`s neck.   
  
From there, the Fox went airborn, flying through some two-hundred feet through the air before slamming back down on it`s opposite side, and at the same time, the Konig was rocked by a blistering hail of gattling gunfire. Leena had hung back, taking the smart route for once and allowing Brad to do the close-in work. She wasn`t the best by any means, but with her confidence back and tempered by an insecurity that knew few limits, as well as a mental condition that could easily be summed as being a trigger happy, gun slinging psychopath, she was improving drastically.   
  
The shots stopped.   
  
_ Keep that in mind, I designed this rhyme   
  
_ "Give up yet?" Leena asked, the Gunsniper`s stance widening a bit. The Konig Wolf lumbered back to it`s feet, several parts of it`s white armor blackened under the assault, even dinged up pretty harshly at some points. Leyla`s response made her blood boil, but it also steeled her resolve to win the match - on her own if that`s what it took.   
  
"I`m just getting started."   
  
The Konig turned to face the Gunsniper, growling gutturally before issuing out a loud roar, chilling Leena to the bone for a brief moment, just long enough to keep her from making what could`ve been a critical attack. At the same time, the show held Leyla and her Zoid in place long enough for Brad to get back into the thick of things, lunging forward and slamming the smaller Scout Fox shoulder-first into the larger Konig Wolf, knocking it off balance for all of a split second, just long enough to open fire with his main gun.   
  
What caught him off guard was that Leyla dodged.   
  
At point blank, she had dodged out of the way of a stream of plasma moving at least twice the speed of sound.   
  
At point blank.   
  
"Somehow, I don`t think we can win this," he concluded with a dry tone of voice as the Konig Wolf whipped around the smaller Scout Fox, skidding to a halt and then opening up with it`s sniper rifles, though Brad was just quick enough to jump out of the way, straight over the shots. Two small explosions sounded in the distance, the Fox landed and the Wolf howled, but the Gunsniper bristled and fired, sheathing the entire area in explosive mortar rockets capable of immolating a Zoid the size of an Elephander.   
  
_ To explain in due time   
  
"I don`t see the freaking point in hanging back like this,"_ Rayth Takahori growled to himself in though, circling around the battlefield`s edge at half-speed. _"Hameros isn`t even **trying** to get involved, he won`t wear himself out at all at this rate."   
  
_ A snort followed. Indignant and annoyed.   
  
Rayth Takahori was not a man prone to taking orders very easily. He wasn`t particularly fond of his employer either, for that matter, but money was enough to convince most people to ignore petty things like gut instinct, mistrust and a severe problem with authority, among other things.   
  
Among other things, he had been promised a great deal of freedom in exchange for his services, and among those freedoms was the right to carry out his appointed tasks in whatever manner he preferred. If that meant he felt like killing a man from thirty miles away with a hijacked cruise missile or stabbing him in the face at point blank, he would do it and he would do it well. The problem with this was that he hadn`t been given that freedom, he had been little more than a pawn on the back burner, given minimal resources and told to do things the way that Rommel wanted them done.   
  
Another thing of note was that Rayth was a man who carried his vendettas for a very long time, and among those vendettas was one with Kyle Mazemia, one that he desperately wanted to resolve. Jamie Hameros also fit into that bill, and he wanted desperately to resolve that vendetta too, but he couldn`t do it the way he wanted because his superiors had ordered him not to.   
  
In short, Rayth Takahori was a very disgruntled employee having a very bad day.   
  
This was most certainly _not_ a good thing.   
  
_ All I know   
  
"Are you even awake?"_ Jamie asked. It felt rather... Empty? Yes, empty to be without the Wild Eagle. For once, he actually missed the annoyance, the lack of privacy, if only because it meant that he could actually hate himself without hating _himself_. It was a strange circle, but in a sense, it fit the bill. A unique dependence by one on the other, even though both of the two personalities utterly despised each other.   
  
_ "Are you even alive?"   
  
_ Still no answer. Jamie was starting to wonder if he had actually killed his alter-ego or not.   
  
_ Time is a valuable thing  
Watch it fly by as the pendulum swings   
  
_ "Good job so far," a rugged voice chimed in as the Scout Fox flew through the air once again, erupting from the smoke like a rocket that`d just been fired accidentally. Leyla tore out after it, her Zoid charred black but still otherwise unscathed, clamping it`s jaws down on the gut of the smaller Fox and then dragging it back to the hard packed desert terrain below.   
  
A howl of pain echoed from the Fox, the Konig let go, having slammed it`s smaller opponent right into the ground from at least fifty feet straight up, coming down at a sickening angle. Brad was screaming out random bursts of profanity and something along the lines of a challenge was being issued by Leena, but the pilot of the Konig Wolf failed to listen to any of it.   
  
Her father`s voice. That was about the only soothing thing right now. Her head was throbbing, she was starting to hear things and her entire body was holding somewhere between numbness and a static electric tingle that made every hair on the back of her neck furiously stand on end.   
  
"Thanks," Leyla grit out finally, drawing away from the Scout Fox and turning towards the Gunsniper, only to dodge out of the way of a blistering hail of two pound slugs a few seconds later. Leena was on the warpath. Again.   
  
_ Watch it count down to the end of the day  
The clock ticks life away  
  
_ Hundreds of miles away, near the newly born Geno Breaker, Bill Chapman wearily noticed the utter lack of coherent speech from his old partner. It unnerved him to no end, enough that he almost timidly reached out to stroke the top of the creature`s nuzzle, seeking to comfort it.   
  
Borealis failed to respond in any real way.   
  
_** Aeregethretnohaikawaiowutnakalesdevreyahdesoulmegandosaladehadrosd-...   
  
**_ Silence.   
  
_ "What`s wrong, partner?"_ Bill asked.   
  
**_ -... Diroknukoizenwajainalakumpaladirosneviotchkasanderaiveolnoromak-...   
  
_** Silence.   
  
_ "Borealis?"_ A gentle nudge to the side of the Organoid`s head.   
  
** Rekvaganaronamohkaiotaskaeritnokaliozavaridaichimasaindonohaidataroo-   
  
**_ -... Kriagnavoksamodeyvernsitookaparadenaiokvokailaradenosaviwukandra-...   
  
- VROCKNAHAIEEDLASON!   
  
_ "What the hell?" Bill asked aloud, his voice little more than a low whisper in the emptiness of the hangar. Only Spectacle remained, and the green Organoid seemed far too amused to do anything at all.   
  
_ How the mighty have fallen...   
  
_ "Eh?" Bill asked, hearing Spectacle`s words. Even if he had no Zoidian blood in him at all, Chapman was gifted with a natural talent for hearing things.   
  
That or he was just mentally insane. Whichever fit the bill better.   
  
_ It's so unreal   
  
** I AM BEING SUMMONED!!!   
  
**_ Bill`s attention snapped to Borealis, who had literally flung himself to his feet in an irate cry of some emotion or other that humans just couldn`t understand. The closest thing to equate it to was a mixture of desire, love, obsession and battle frenzy.   
  
**_ FIGHT IT, CHILD! THE CALLING MUST NOT BE HEEDED THIS TIME!!!   
  
_** Amusing indeed.   
  
Didn't look out below   
  
"Partner?" Bill asked hesitantly, standing up and reaching out to the seemingly insane Organoid, which had started to glow a feral mixture of blue, red and black.   
  
**_ SHE BECKONS ME ONCE AGAIN!!!   
  
_** That glow turned into a burning nova, and Chapman soon went flying into a wall hard enough to make his back pop from the impact, the force carrying throughout the hangar with such strength that it even rocked the tremendous bulk of the Geno Breaker. The flash faded to reveal nothing but a vaguely dragon-shaped outline of black shaded in blue and red, which immediately became a comet of unbelievable speed, blurring into a wide angling arch over the Geno Breaker, circling around for several seconds and then -   
  
"**_DON`T!_**"   
  
_ Watch the time go right out the window   
  
_ - sheering right through the portion of the hangar wall that the unfortunate Bill Chapman was leaned against, heedless of the fact that a decade-long friend was almost killed instantly as a result. Metal screeched and howled, and then, the multi-colored bullet of energy tore out of the side of the Whale King`s enormous lower jaw, blowing a five yard wide hole in one of the gigantic carrier`s teeth in the process.   
  
Borealis vanished into the clouds, bylining for a destination that only he seemed to know. Bill was left to get sucked right out of the hangar and fall to his death from ten thousand feet - or get sucked into one of the colossal jet engines of the huge beast.   
  
_ Trying to hold on but didn't even know   
  
_ He stopped though, hanging on by a shred as the Organoid he`d thought of like an adoptive brother for ten years vanished into the distance, leaving him to die there.   
  
"**_BOREALIS!!!_**"   
  
_ Wasted it all just to watch you go   
  
_ And he would have, too.   
  
_ Going somewhere, little pawn?   
  
_ He would have. But he didn`t.   
  
_ I kept everything inside  
And even though I tried  
  
_** I have failed. The young one has fallen to the cry of his heart.   
  
**_ It all fell apart   
  
_ "You did your best," Madison replied drearily from her perch, seated high atop the crested, feathered head of the enormous Organoid, Roc. "It was inevitable."   
  
** Indeed. Even the elders of this generation fall to the oncoming darkness. I can only sense two who have not, yet I fear that they will both be put to the flame far too soon to be of any aid. The others have all long since gone to the shadows.   
  
** "Disappointing," she stated simply, not one to lengthen her words out. Madison was a particularly blunt person, even more so now that her memories had returned. "What next?"   
  
** ... I... Do not know. Fate will have to be our guide for now,** Roc stated, his ancient wisdom falling a step short for one of the few times since his Birth. Even the First Born had his limitations, after all. Madison only voiced something thoughtful and leaned back against the highest standing feather on top of Roc`s head, speaking no further.   
  
_ What it meant to me, will eventually   
  
** I AM ANSWERING! WE ARE ANSWERING YOU!!!   
  
** Be a memory of a time when   
  
_ Leyla grit her teeth for the umpteenth time, dodging up and over the now-battle scarred Scout Fox, twisting in mid-jumpt avoid the streaks of gunfire from the distant Gunsniper. She had yet to even get the chance to make a close-in attack on Leena, let alone try and snipe her. Brad was too persistent, too stubborn to stay down long enough for her to pick off the other member of the Blitz Team, or at least the one that was actually _fighting_.   
  
There was also the matter of the wild card.   
  
_ I tried so hard, and got so far   
  
_ Jamie sighed heavily to himself. The silence in the cockpit was nerve wracking in and of itself, but after several minutes of trying to think of something - broken frequently by random checks on whether or not the Wild Eagle was alive, dead or unconcious - he had made his choice. In either case, the choice wasn`t an easy one. He was effectively breaking the trust of either of the people he chose to fire upon, at least, that`s how he felt.   
  
In truth he would`ve been fine to fire on Leyla. She wouldn`t have minded at all, it _was_ a Zoid battle after all. His mistake was the silent treatment. It was like everything was hinging on his shoulders, _his_ choice.   
  
And now, Jamie had decided on who he would fire on, and damn the consequences.   
_  
But in the end, it doesn't even matter   
  
_ "I`m sorry," he finally muttered to his target, whichever target it would be.   
  
The Raynos looped up, coming back down in a steep dive...   
  
_ I had to fall, to lose it all   
  
"Here I go..."   
  
But in the end, it doesn't even matter   
  
_** "Warning! Warning! Unauthorized personnel have entered the battlefield, exit immediately!"   
  
** "Huh?!" Jamie yelped in surprise, relief washing over him in an instant. The Raynos pulled up from it`s dive with a snap turn, just as a familiar black outline appeared in the distance.   
  
"I remember you..."   
  
_ One thing, I don't know why   
  
_ The action on the ground paused, Leyla twitched, Brad grimaced and Leena cursed her luck, shifting aim in under a second to try and draw a bead on the incoming target, only to find Jamie in her sights instead. The Raynos was moving on an intercept course for the Black Stormsworder, but it wasn`t quick enough this time...   
  
_ It doesn't even matter how hard you try   
  
_ Rayth swooped in low to the ground, almost suicidally low, flying in and kicking up a massive half-tunnel of dust and dirt as he broke the sound barrier, the blades on his wings extending forward with an ethereal, intense orange glow.   
  
"_Shut_..."   
  
** "Unauthorized in-"   
  
** "**_UP!_**"   
  
One pass and the decapitated head of the Judge went flying through the air, landing with a loud thud. The Stormsworder`s wing sliced through the back of the Judge Capsule instantly, streaking back up into the air with the agility of something utterly unnatural in make.   
  
"That rotten, limey _bastard_," Leena growled out irately, watching the Stormsworder swiftly pass through a salvo of shots from Jamie overhead, entering into a wide angled turn.   
  
_ Keep that in mind, I designed this rhyme   
  
_ "Hold still," Jamie ordered annoyedly, falling back to his usual behavior as a result. The other Zoid and it`s pilot practically laughed at him in response, breaking into an insane zig-zag through the skies, breaking and bursting at complete random while the Raynos turned in a wide circle, trying to keep up, or at least fluke a hit or two.   
  
The last time Jamie Hameros had done battle with Rayth Takahori, he`d had the element of surprise and obscurity on his side. This time, Rayth was more than prepared for him.   
  
_ To remind myself how   
  
** I`M COMING!!!   
  
** I tried so hard   
  
_ On the ground though, Leyla Tsun was on the verge of hyperventilating. She couldn`t figure out why, she truly didn`t have a clue what was going on.   
  
The truth of the matter was that Leyla happened to be undergoing a critical period of development, her three personalities where on the verge of fusing together, or completely, permanently remaining in the shattered state they`d been in when she 'woke up.'   
  
_ In spite of the way you were mocking me   
  
_ "Is that the best you can do, Hameros?!" Rayth demanded hotly, twisting through another volley of gunfire from the the Raynos, only to dive down and corkscrew out of the way of a volley of gunfire from the Scout Fox a second later.   
  
"No, it isn`t," Jamie growled out, breaking into a slow turn and allowing Rayth to finish his manuever, biding his time for the course of several seconds, and then erupting forward with every ounce of power in the engines at once. The result was that Takahori was caught off guard, and had to fold his wings into the body of the Stormsworder, cut his engines and all away or get cut in half by the razor edge of the Raynos` wings, but it also left them both exposed still: Rayth to Jamie`s tailguns and Jamie to Rayth`s missiles.   
  
Both shifted for better aim, and both opened fire at once. Jamie`s gunshots blasted Rayth`s missiles, they were at a sheer impasse.   
  
_ Acting like I was part of your property   
  
_ Three voices spoke at once.   
  
"Stop it!"   
  
Three voices spoke at once.   
  
"I don`t want this!"   
  
Three voices screamed at once.   
  
"**_WHAT`S HAPPENING TO ME?!_**"   
  
  
"_Crap_," Paul muttered to himself, promptly shoving Drake down into the foot of the Gustav cockpit, making sure to keep the overly-excited boy covered for the time being. A second later, he put the gears into reverse and frantically began to reverse, at the same time opening up a channel to the HoverCargo.   
  
"Get the hell out of here while you can, she`s gone nuts!"   
  
"Huh?"   
  
"It`s too complex to explain, just get out of the area. Your team may be safe but _you_ are a big, fat, utterly exposed, slow moving target right about now!"   
  
With that, the HoverCargo`s engines started. Steven Tauros normally didn`t take warnings to heart most of the time, unless the warnings were spoken with fear, anxiety and panic going for them. This warning, had all three at once.   
  
_ Remembering all the times you fought with me   
  
_ Three minds vied for control of one body. Three minds with various goals to be reached after taking control.   
  
The first was Leyla. Her goal was to just stay the dominant personality and not get eradicated. The second was Eliza, who`s only real goal was survival and remembrance. The third was Connie, who just wanted freedom at any cost. They were three minds, locked away in one body, and right now, they were all fighting for both survival and control with everything they had.   
  
The changes of the mind however, reflected changes of the body, and the changes of the body reflected changes of the Zoid, all of it directly interlinked with one true cause.   
  
_ I'm surprised it got so far   
  
_ There was a blinding flash of light within the cockpit, but it stopped soon after it was born. The flash obscured the change of the body, which reflected a change of the mind.   
  
The irises of the body`s eyes had turned a solid red, the hair had turned a solid blue and the lips were now completely black. Three distinguishing features for three different personalities.   
  
There was another blinding flash of light, but this one was from the outside of the cockpit. Brad, Jamie, Rayth and Leena all took notice of it, a streaking bullet of red, black and blue, echoed by a chorus of Voices, dozens strong. The streak of energy corkscrewed between Jamie and Rayth, up in the sky, turning at a sharp right angle and -   
  
**_ REBIRTH!!!   
  
_** - diving straight down into the back of the Konig Wolf, drawing out an insane howl as the sniper rifles literally detonated, hiding the Zoid briefly in a flaring black cloud of flame and smoke.   
  
_ Things aren't the way they were before   
  
_ And then...   
  
_ You wouldn't even recognize me anymore   
  
It_ emerged.   
  
_ Not that you knew me back then   
  
_ "What in the hell?" Brad muttered at the sight of it. It was the Konig Wolf, but not.   
  
The changes of the mind had been reflected in the changes of the Zoid.   
  
The Konig Wolf now had three heads, where before, there was one. Each head held different color eyes, black to one side, red to the other and blue sitting between. It had gotten a bit larger now, the damage was _gone_, as were it`s smoke bomb launchers. Ice white armor covered this new creation, and in it`s cockpit lay a young woman enshrouded in cables that had launched from panels and the seating, all over her body and head.   
  
The chorus sounded again, six Voices leading a cry of fifty or more:   
  
**_ JAMIE!!!   
  
_** But it all comes back to me   
  
His head hurt from the mere sound of the Voice that had issued from the changed Konig Wolf, his mind literally tingled with pain. Rayth had only briefly stopped his onslaught though, and before Jamie knew it, he was dodging gunfire again, missiles streaking at random, blades slinging through the air at mach one. And these were the least of the troubles taking place right now...   
  
_ In the end   
  
_ "What the hell does she want with Ja-**_HOLY SHIT!_**"   
  
The Scout Fox went flying again, blasted from the ground by what looked like no less than three furious charged particle beams at once, each of which continued on, almost hitting the small, now brutalized Zoid again, only to stop a second later. It stopped for a simple reason, of course.   
  
Leyla/Eliza/Connie had finally remembered Leena. The target that Leyla wasn`t given the chance to hit earlier.   
  
Slowly, the newly born Cerberus lumbered around, turning to face the smaller Gunsniper in the distance. Leena met the psychotic stare of the Zoid with nothing but trigger pulling, sending off every single ounce of ammunition she had left in under a second at the distant Cerberus, vaguely confident that the other, larger Zoid couldn`t cover the distance to her quickly enough to dodge.   
  
Seconds later, after the Cerberus had ripped the the Gunsniper`s forearms off and bit a sizable chunk out of it`s throat, Leena had changed her mind quite a bit.   
  
The Gunsniper toppled over, dead for the time being. Every system was frozen, but at least it hadn`t come with an electrical shock comparable to a lightning bolt this time. Leena sighed, but only until the actual recognition of her current situation hit her: She was down, her Zoid couldn`t function - that meant the cockpit was probably unable to open - and a hellhound was currently towering over her with ruthless intent.   
  
"I`m screwed."   
  
_ You kept everything inside and   
  
_ "Where`s your skill and wit now, huh?!" Rayth demanded, spraying off shots at Jamie with little care as to exactly where all of his missed rounds hit. The two were dueling at mach two in the clouds above what had been an officially sanctioned battlefield, what was now just a potential bloodbath as an entity born of an Ancient Zoidian and an Organoid gone mad was threatening to kill everything in sight.   
  
**_ WHERE ARE YOU?!   
  
_** Jamie rattled in the cockpit, twisting out of the way of Rayth`s blades at the last second and corkscrewing back down through the clouds. Long range sights were the only way for him to see that the Cerberus was about to smash in the Gunsniper`s cockpit.   
  
Hesitation. Then...   
  
"Leyla?" He asked, slowing down and hoping to try and talk his way out of it, even as Rayth took up a chase position behind the Raynos, coming down with his blades set to tear off the faster Zoid`s engines, though Jamie didn`t even notice him this time.   
  
**_ WHY WON`T YOU ANSWER ME?!   
  
_** The mutated Konig made ready to strike, and Rayth continued coming in, intent on making the kill.   
  
"**_LEYLA! IT`S ME! CALM DOWN ALREADY!_**"   
  
A pause. The Cerberus paused from making it`s intended kill, stepping back as all three heads leered up dangerously to the skies. In the cockpit, the teen inside twitched and growled, bits of red tears falling down every now and then. Rayth came closer.   
  
**_ DON`T TELL ME WHAT TO DO!!!   
  
_** Jamie yelped in shock, and Rayth immediately dove down, while the Raynos swiftly rolled to the left, a charged particle beam from one of the Konig-heads tearing through the skies where he`d just been. That was when he`d realized how mistaken he`d been to try and talk to her, and when he realized that Rayth was now perfectly lined up to make a killing blow with his blades.   
  
"Shit."   
  
_ Even though I tried, it all fell apart   
  
_ An audible crack, like a baseball bat nailing that winning homerun in utter silence.   
  
_ What it meant to me, will eventually   
  
_ His eyes blanked for an instant, his cheek looked bruised in the imprint of the sole of his own sneakers, but his mind was elsewhere, tumbling to ground that didn`t even exist, jarred out of control by a surprise attack from somewhere else.   
  
His eyes returned to their normal color, but their shape changed a bit, the same for his cheek, and his hair became the familiar, streaked-back pattern it had been so many times before.   
  
"Nothing personal."   
  
The Wild Eagle was back in business.   
  
_ Be a memory, of a time when   
  
_ Rayth burst forward -   
  
_ I tried so hard, and got so far  
But in the end, it doesn't even matter   
  
_ - and found out the hard way that the Wild Eagle was as dangerous an opponent as anyone else, corkscrewing up and over the Black Stormsworder before leveling off again. Instantly, with such speed that even a battle tested veteran like Rayth Takahori was caught off guard, a shower of pulse gunfire tore through the air, nailing the other Zoid right in each engine, surgically disabling it with the precision of a Gunsniper at mach two.   
  
"Toodaloo, shitface!"   
  
Rayth twitched.   
  
"I hate this crap," he finally growled out, even as the Stormsworderwent down in flames.   
  
_ I had to fall, to lose it all  
But in the end, it doesn't even matter   
  
_ More charged particle beams scythed through the air, three this time. The Wild Eagle expertly dove between each and every one of them, coming down to where he could clearly pick out the Konig Cerberus, though the other Zoid still hung close to the downed Gunsniper. That was when 'Will' realized something.   
  
Three heads meant that the Konig had completely mutated to match the personalities of it`s pilot, likely representing each one with each head. The problem was that Will didn`t know which head was which personality, and he didn`t know what it would do if he simply blew one off. He wasn`t willing to risk hitting the body because that probably had a major symbolism to it as well, enough that it would probably injure the pilot.   
  
In short: The Wild Eagle realized that for the first time in his existence, he needed Jamie`s help on something.   
  
That single fact alone made him twitch.   
  
_ I've put my trust in you, pushed as far as I can go   
  
"Any ideas?"   
  
"Why should I help you? You can do anything I can`t, remember?"   
  
"Yeah, I know that. But **you** can do anything **I** can`t, and **I** can`t pick out a freaking target here..."   
  
"So?"   
  
"If you don`t help me, Leena will probably get killed, along with Brad, and probably the Doc too."   
  
_ Silence. The Wild Eagle continued dodging through charged particle beams with the same relentlessness as the one being shown in firing them.   
  
_ And for all this, there's only one thing you should know   
  
"Well?"_ Will asked with a bit of a frantic tone, becoming increasingly unwilling to just sit by and dodge through attempts to kill him. Really, there was only so far kindness and loyalty could go before survival instinct kicked in.   
  
_ I've put my trust in you   
  
"Alright. My guess isn`t really that informed-" "I don`t care if it`s in the know or not, it`s better than anything I`ve got right now,"_ the Wild Eagle interrupted, corkscrewing around another beam and then almost coming to a dead stop in mid-air to avoid the one that shot into his path after that.   
  
_ "Take off any two of the heads. I`m guessing the middle one is Leyla, the one on the left is Eliza and the one on the right is Connie,"_ Jamie advised a bit dryly. Obviously, his brief powertrip over the Wild Eagle had ended, as had his small burst of confidence and decisiveness.   
  
_ Pushed as far as I can go   
  
_ "Here we go then..."   
  
_ For all this   
  
"Yeah. Right."   
  
There's only one thing you should know   
  
_ The Raynos suddenly broke away, dodging through another hail of charged particle beams, then going into a wide, angling turn back towards the Cerberus, dodging through more and more beams every single second. It made aiming next to impossible, but the Wild Eagle was known for doing the impossible, and he did it again this time.   
  
_ I tried so hard, and got so far   
  
_ A squeeze of the trigger, and a howl of pain broke out as the first head - the one to the left - went down in a blaze of gunfire. With the head that had black eyes now gone, Leyla`s body twitched violently, and Eliza either died or went comatose as a result. Borealis screeched with matching pain. Only two beams fired this time, and both soon halted completely as the Zoid gave in to the pain experienced by both pilot and Organoid, leaving it exposed.   
  
That left Connie and Leyla.   
  
The question of where Jamie`s loyalties lied had yet to be answered, but the question of the Wild Eagle`s loyalties -   
  
_ But in the end, it doesn't even matter   
  
_ "Sorry, babe."   
  
_ I had to fall, and lose it all   
  
_ - was answered as the head representing Connie went flying loose, cleanly severed at the neck in one pass by the Raynos` wing. The Konig Wolf howled, falling to it`s stomach and ceasing all movement, while Borealis - still a mixture of blue, red and black - exploded out of the side, landing with a loud impact in the dirt before his bulged gut split open, allowing Leyla to tumble out to the ground a second later.   
  
_ "You can have it,"_ Will commented, letting go as Jamie took the reigns again, bringing the Raynos around for a landing pass near the dying, fossilizing Konig Wolf. He didn`t feel concern for the dejected way that the Wild Eagle had given control back to him, in truth, Jamie didn`t really care.   
  
_ But in the end, it doesn't even matter   
  
_ The cockpit flipped open and the teen jumped over the side, tumbling at least twenty feet through the air before landing with a shock through his legs, already taking off into a run for the downed figure of a young woman with blood dripping from her shoulders, lying next to an unconcious Organoid.   
  
  
In a bleakly lit cell in the middle of a now-landed Whale King, Bill Chapman sat, utterly alone. His right forearm was still bleeding from how Spectacle had literally yanked him back in with his claws. There wasn`t even a window, the setting was so claustrophobic that he felt like puking.   
  
On top of that, Bill Chapman had no one to confide in. His best friend of ten years had essentially betrayed him, and he knew it. Borealis had gone and picked someone else over the guy that had given him a home.   
  
He`d broken contact with his family to be a Zoid Warrior - just like Bit Cloud did. His team mates were all dead. His best friend - and only emotional support in his current conditions - had stranded him in hostile territory and his freedom had been stolen, replaced by the threat of an exquisitely painful series of punishments, concluding in an instant death by having his head blown off.   
  
Bill Chapman grimaced to himself, leaning back against the uncomfortable steel wall of his cell, elbows resting on his knees, legs pulled up close to his body.   
  
A near audible snap could be vaguely registered as he shut his eyes - increasingly less carefree - and opened them again - cold and angry.   
  
_ "I`ll get you for this,"_ he swore to himself under his breath, making the vow to kill Borealis - _and_ Vilhelm Rommel at _any_ cost.   
  
  
A roar of thunder punctuated the sound of thrusters igniting. Stigma Stoller uneasily stood alone, the half-crumpled sheet of paper authorizing the deputization of the Fury Team in one hand, both arms crossed over his chest. His brows were furrowed in a deep frown, his eyes set on the rising form of the newly dubbed 'Foe Hammer,' which now sported a fairly stand-out looking insignia across either of it`s sides. It was that of the Guardian Force.   
  
Vega, along with the Fury and it`s three current armor systems, was on the modified midget carrier Zoid. It was night time at the base, rain was starting to fall and he`d been ordering the complete evacuation under the orders of General Otto Schubaltz, who`d gone off of advice from Vega himself. Technically, Stigma didn`t _have_ to follow the orders of the General, he _was_ a civilian after all, but for the sake of being prudent, he had done so. Everyone but the Fury Team was being put on suspended leave with pay, their Zoids being packed away in a Guardian Force Whale King, the Elvea Varya, excluding his own Zoid.   
  
Stigma Stoller was not a man who trusted authority anymore. He hadn`t trusted _any_ authority since the Five Kings project, and he`d become increasingly more so since he left the Backdraft Group, just prior to it`s downfall. As such, the Elephander was staying with him, along with several other Zoids owned by members of his teams who had a similar distrust. Most of them were staying behind with him, at least until Stigma`s own private Whale King, the Blackwater Ironside, was ready to go. It wasn`t as large as the type used by the Guardian Force, or even some other private organizations, but it got the job done.   
  
_ "I don`t like this,"_ Stigma thought.   
  
** [**_"**What?!**"   
  
"They spotted Kale just a few miles from the Garnhelm base, near the Kravenoft Ruins. We think he might be readying to attack, but we`re not sure and it`s the best lead we`ve got."   
  
"So you`re sending Vega to do it?"   
  
"He`s the only man available for the job, civilian." "That`s just **it**, he`s not a man, he`s a fucking **kid**!"   
  
"You`re the one who trained him," Otto Schubaltz stated dryly after handing over the sheets of paper authorizing Vega`s draft into the Guardian Force. "Unless you haven`t got a better idea, I suggest you keep your mouth shut."_**] **_  
  
"I don`t like it at all."   
  
_ With a disgruntled sigh that sounded more like a growling, infuriated wolf, Stoller turned around and walked back into the hangar. He was sopping wet from the neck up due to the make of his trench coat, the sheet of paper had been laminated completely, even if it _was_ half-crumpled. The only reason he was holding onto it with such a death grip was because he didn`t trust an authority-type to honor his own words, and the draft was set to become null as soon as the issue with Kale was ended. Vega was still a boy after all, and the militaries of the past _had_ adopted children and turned them into fighting machines before.   
  
Otto, on the other hand, remained out in the rain, hands held together behind his back. He was still getting drenched but that didn`t quite matter at all. A hardened military man like his ancestor, Karl Schubaltz, Otto was hellbent on upholding a specific tradition, dating back several hundred years to the no-longer spoken of time when Van Fleiheit and his Blade Liger became a Zoid-sized bullet against the second Death Saurer.   
  
The tradition was that when a unit was sent on a specifically dangerous mission - usually a suicide mission - their superiors, inferiors and equals would all stay at the point of departure long enough to give a stern show of respect, even if that meant getting drenched in rain or shot at by an enemy sniper. That said, Otto waited until the Foe Hammer had turned to face him before raising one hand in a stiff military salute, never knowing that the four-part crew of the carrier Zoid each returned it in kind, even Kat, who was arguably the most disgruntled person on Zi after learning that her first bit of bonding time with Kyle in months had been cut off so that she could go get killed.   
  
Lightning struck in the distance, the roar of thunder briefly obscured the sound of the main engines blaring to life. From there, the Hammerhead II was gone, heading to the Southwest, towards Kravenoft Ruins.   
  
  
And speaking of Kyle...   
  
"You look like Hell."   
  
"Feel like it, too."   
  
"You just stay here, _I`ll_ get the luggage," Abbie ordered sternly, immediately taking off in a light jog towards the unloading area. Kyle raised a brow. "Is she always that protective of you when you`re hurt?"   
  
"Usually more so," Mark answered with a twitch, grumbling something under his breath as the other moved to stand next to him. "I brought the Zoids, by the way," Kyle commented as an afterthought before continuing. He`d only heard the extreme tail end of what his partner had muttered out.   
  
"... No cotton candy? Huh?"   
  
Mark twitched. "Abbie Speak."   
  
Kyle blinked. "... Abbie Spea... k... _Ohhhh_... Damn, that`s some screwed up lingo there..."   
  
"You`re not the one on the receiving end. She`s been doing this ever since I became a Zoid Warrior... 'Nuuu cotton candy if you`re hurt!'"   
  
A pause.   
  
"And yeah, that includes things as flimsy as papercuts."   
  
"... You poor, deprived bastard."   
  
Another twitch. "Tell me about it..."   
  
Silence. Kyle smirked. The smirk became a grin. The grin began to become a snicker.   
  
"_Nuuuuu_ cotton candy for _Mar_-"   
  
The snicker lead to a backhand, and the backhand lead to... Well...   
  
"**_FUCK! YOUR NOSE STABBED MY HAND! AGAIN!_**" Mark yelped in pain, holding his now-bruised hand as if it actually _had_ been stabbed.   
  
"**_NEVER HIT A BISHOUNEN IN THE FACE!_**" Kyle cackled from the floor, even as his admittedly sharp looking nose started to bruise a bit.   
  
The Suicide Team was back together again.   
  


_ End Chapter Thirty-Four  
  


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_

**Author`s Note:** A bit of comedy before the end, yes? >_>;  
  
**Rhade:** I think we just dispelled any beliefs of ol` Markie being lucky, yes? XD *Cackles malignantly.*  
  
**EndlessAdventure:** Close, but no cigar. You`ll find out next chapter :P As for Jamie... I intend on having quite a bit of fun at his expense the next times he takes center stage *Dr Evil laugh.* And yes, you`re quite a corrupting influence... In a good way, of course >_>  
  
A/N finished next chapter.  
  



	36. The Night That Dreams Died

  
  
**Disclaimer:** I don`t own Zoids. BYE NOW!!!  
  


* * *

  
  
**

New Age

**  
The Night That Dreams Died   
  
  
  
The sun set to the east, police were swarming across the entirety of what had been a battlefield mere hours earlier. The remains of the destroyed Judge Capsule were being hauled up by a team of Godos units, while the remains of the dead Konig Wolf were being chipped away at to get to it`s core, which was thought to still be relatively salvageable despite all of the damage that had been done to the Zoid as a whole, while the remains of the Black Stormsworder were completely shot to Hell, not even the core had survived.   
  
Paul Tsun and his son weren`t too far away, though the older of the two was obviously miffed to say the least. The younger was just a bit scared and a bit out of it, put things _lightly_.   
  
Borealis was surrounded on all sides by a number of men in bio-hazard suits, each of whom was in the process of working the downed Organoid over with the same freezing compound usually reserved for use on partially damaged Zoid cores to help stabilize them until proper repairs could be made.   
  
The catch was that these men wore no insiginias on their suits like most of theothers, and the police weren`t saying who they were. Everyone on the Blitz Team could easily guess that they were either Guylos, Helic or Guardian Force, obviously a black ops unit of some kind. Borealis, for his part, was unconcious, and as a result, unable to do anything to stop them, while an armed guard prevented anyone from trying to interfere.   
  
The Gunsniper had been loaded back into the HoverCargo by now, as had the Scout Fox - which was still able to function on it`s own with relative ease despite it`s battle damage. It was probably the toughest Zoid that Brad had ever piloted, but he _still_ couldn`t stand the thing. Leena on the other hand, was standing next to her father, annoyedly calm and quiet, literally biting her tongue to not blurt out anything offensive at the scene playing out not to far from them.   
  
This was probably due to the fact that Steven and Brad were both giving her death glares that could probably give _Kale_ a chill or two. They were doing this for a simple reason: Respect for a mutual friend. At least that was Brad`s only reason, Steven also had to deal with the fact that said-friend was also an employee and his godson.   
  
The last part of the wide scene playing out was the one between the two people who had decided most of the day`s events, namely Jamie Hameros and Leyla Tsun. The latter of the two was still bleeding from the shoulders, though she was also bearing a new piece to her ensemble: a pair of shackles across her wrists. Attempted murder and seeming criminal insanity weren`t things the Battle Commission took lightly. A guard stood nearby, imposing despite actually having a fairly short stature.   
  
"So..."   
  
"Where are they taking you?" Jamie asked with a sigh, standing across from her by a few steps.   
  
"The Transtock Temporary Home for the Criminally Insane, I`m guessing," Leyla replied with a sardonic tone, her voice seeming a bit more enchanting - was that the word for it? - than usual. "I`ve heard of the place, it`s supposed to be a temporary evaluation-type of thing."   
  
"And then?"   
  
"And then they`ll probably try me for attempted murder," she answered with a shrug. Jamie frowned deeply, it had been a bad enough day as it was. "How`re you holding up right now, anyway?" He finally asked.   
  
"I`m not sure. I`ve been kinda... Flooded with things. Memories, I guess. I`m not sure what they mean or what they`re supposed to be, but the only thing I can really get out of them is that I`m not... Human... Er..."   
  
"You`re an Ancient Zoidian then?" Jamie asked with a bit of surprise. It would have been more so but really - when someone fuses with an Organoid and mutates a Zoid all on their lonesome, it tends to remove the shock value from things. Leyla only vaguely nodded in recognition of the word, as if it struck an old, untouched chord somewhere in the very back of her thoughts.   
  
"Sounds about right," she finally stated dimly. "Though... There is one thing that`s kinda sticking out."   
  
"What?" Jamie asked.   
  
"Nyx. The Dark Continent," she answered, the second part coming a bit hesitantly. "Just... Don`t _ever_ go there, alright?" She asked dryly, not sure why she was giving the warning in the first place, but doing it anyway. Jamie gave another nod and sighed again. "I won`t."   
  
"Alright _kids_," the guard finally chimed in annoyedly. "Time to go."   
  
"I`ll visit you whenever I can, and write too... And call," Jamie assured after several seconds of apprehensively staring at the guard, looking back at Leyla in the process. What he found waiting for him was a fairly lengthy, drawn out kiss on the lips, even if it _was_ cut a bit short for his tastes. Surprised as he was, he embraced it, and at some point in the process, he could swear he felt the Wild Eagle actually cheering for him.   
  
Within a second or two though, it was over. Leyla and Jamie both drew away and the guard started to step forward, taking the girl by the arm and virtually dragging her away.   
  
"Bye!" Leyla called out.   
  
"See ya soon, Leyla!" Jamie shouted back, standing there with an undeniably silly little awestruck smirk on his face. For once, even if things had basically gone straight to Hell, they were starting to look up in the most unlikely of ways. Even Paul seemed to be agreeing to it, and he absolutely _hated_ having Leyla around boys her own age.   
  
As for the other observers...   
  
"Ahhh, young love," Leena fawned like the rabid fangirl she could be at times.   
  
"The single greatest cancer that has ever plagued the face of Zi," Brad commented with a lazily cheerful tone.   
  
"Yep," Steven shrugged in agreement with the same tone to his voice.   
  
  
The Kravenoft Ruins, situated two miles south of Garnhelm Base, just beyond the steep 'shelf' drop that came with the distance involved. It was night time, the ancient structure looked like an old corpse left out in the desert for too long.   
  
Kravenoft was once a religious temple dedicated to the deities of the Ancient Zoidians, it towered over most structures since it was almost the same height as a Whale King. The years had not been kind to the enormous structure though, and now what was once undeniable grandeur had been reduced to a deathly shadow of it`s former glory. War, apocalypse, looting, time and the relentless conditions of the weather had all worn away so that the ancient symbols only could only vaguely be seen without some sort of visual aid.   
  
These things didn`t concern the twelve year old pilot of the Razorwind Fury. He had more pressing matters to deal with - like the fact that his only real reason for being out at the Kravenoft Ruins was currently hidden somewhere inside. Kale had apparently made the place into his own personal rest stop for a few days, probably to allow the Geno Saurer or Shadow the chance to catch their mutual breath. Vega was willing to bet that his older brother was still sitting in the Geno`s cockpit, arms crossed murderously over his chest, just waiting for his Zoid and the Organoid to finish resting up.   
  
He also knew he was probably wrong. Kale was able to read him like a book after all, it wasn`t too far fetched that the older of the two brothers would be have the foresight involved in manipulating the Guardian Force into throwing Vega at him.   
  
He had little, if any clue, how utterly wrong he was.   
  
With a roar of compressed air and super-powered electronics, the Fury launched like a bullet from the rail on the underside of the Foe Hammer, landing with the sounds of crunched, centuries-old stone and pavement, then skidding along for several seconds into the weathered remains of the ancient structure.   
  
"Alright guys, head to the base and hope I don`t get killed..."   
  
"Ever the optimist," Lars pointed out with obvious sarcasm only to be smacked upside the head a few seconds later by Dana.   
  
"Come back alive," the older woman ordered sternly, bringing the Hammerhead II around to point at the nearby base, then blasting away at medium speed.   
  
"I will," Vega said, though he didn`t mean it. The youth wasn`t terribly keen on making promises he couldn`t knowingly keep after all, so he didn`t even try acting like he would. Vega truthfully didn`t even believe that he would survive the third round of his battles with his older brother, let alone succeed in it. As such, he wasn`t fighting for survival or victory - he was fighting to cause _damage_. His heart was racing in his chest as the Zoid lumbered forward slowly, hesitantly vanishing into the darkness of the old temple, even as a familiar silhouette appeared not too far away.   
  
Two clacking sounds echoed in the quiet of the night, and the Geno Saurer went rigid...   
  
  
It had been earlier in the day when Fiona Alysse Linette-Fleiheit walked out from her home. It was near mid-day, in fact. She was clad in the same pink-and-red dress that had once been her trademark clothing, and despite the age that had only seemed to begin catching up to her, the blonde lady still held the same grace and beauty that had also once been her trademark, moving fluidly to an oddly out-of-place collection of weeds in the middle of her front yard, at the very base of the hill that her home had been built on.   
  
An oddity of these weeds was that Fiona had never let anyone cut them away, and had always told her daughter and the ones who came after her to avoid playing around it - usually with an excuse that they were poisonous or something like that. Even the Liger Zero and it`s Organoid seemed to give this unassuming patch of growth the respect of not stepping on it, though Bit hadn`t noticed that when he`d arrived at his last visit.   
  
With a tired smile, Fiona knelt down and cleared away the weeds, revealing a simple headstone. It was simple because he had never wanted to have his grave become a place of worship, or historical significance or anything else. He`d just wanted to be left alone in death as he hadn`t been in life. The headstone read with only a simple phrase, it didn`t even list the dates of his birth and death.   
  


_ Here lies Van Fleiheit,  
friend, lover, father and  
hero to the end of his days.  
  
_

"It`s been a long time, hasn`t it, Van?" Fiona asked softly, clearing away the remaining weeds to reveal the edge of the stone, which had become cracked through the years as time took it`s toll on the once seemingly immortal figure buried beneath her feet. "I miss you," she said simply. "But chances are, we`ll see each other again soon. Take care until then..."   
  
"I thought you had Thomas buried somewhere around here as well," Riese commented a bit snidely, the limp in her walk becoming a bit more visible if you actually paid attention to it. It wasn`t a major limp, she didn`t need a cane or anything, it was just that her right leg was weaker beneath the knee than it had been before she had learned to avoid running from the Guardian Force.   
  
"Bitter as ever, I take it?" Fiona asked knowingly, her smile fading as the blue haired Zoidian walked towards her, the old dress-jacket billowing slightly in the wind. She knew that when Riese referred to the long-gone Thomas Schubaltz by his first name rather than 'Schubaltz' or 'Schubaltz` little brother,' she wasn`t meaning it in a respectful _or_ friendly way.   
  
"He put a bullet in my kn-"   
  
"You robbed him of his memories," Fiona cut her off sternly.   
  
"He could have just asked to have them back," Riese snorted indignantly.   
  
"He did. Apparently, his request wasn`t good enough, now was it?" Fiona defended one old friend from the wrath of another. Riese shrugged and dropped the subject from there, moving on to something else...   
  
"How much longer do you think it`ll take them?" She asked, leering out at the storm clouds hovering in the distance. They were all centered ominously around the general area that Bit and Zeke happened to be in.   
  
"Too long," Fiona answered dryly.   
  
"I guess we`ll have to take the high road out, won`t we?" Riese asked. Fiona only shrugged.   
  
  
_ We`re being surrounded...   
  
"You felt them too?"_ Bit asked somberly, not stopping for a moment.   
  
_ Yes. I`m unsure of their numbers or what type of Zoids they`re using, but I can practically smell them.   
  
"Well... We don`t have time for them, now do we?"_ Bit asked, feeling the same intensity that Zeke had been possessed of since they`d set out from the Blitz Team base two days earlier. The two would`ve been at the Wind Colony by now if they`d had the Jaeger armor, but as it stood, the basic armor configuration would have to do. Not like they`d set out with any time to actually switch to Jaeger in the first place.   
  
Liger growled in agreement, pouring even more energy into it`s boosters, only to come to a skidding halt seconds later as a number of dark green Rev Raptors blazed out of the sands in front of it. Canyon walls lined off to either side, it wasn`t wide enough for Bit to just go around them and it wasn`t narrow enough to hold him in place. Behind him, a dozen more of the dark green Rev Raptors emerged from hiding, soon joined by at least an equal amount from either side of the canyon walls, and another six dark green Helcats came from the tops of those very walls a second later.   
  
Bit grit his teeth defiantly, even as a dark green Scout Fox came up from behind, moving in front of the Rev Raptors.   
  
"_Shit_."   
  
"Bit Cloud! You have one minute to surrender peacefully, otherwise, we`ll kill you where your Zoid stands."   
  
  
Brad uneasily sat by on the bridge of the HoverCargo, Leena and Jamie sitting not too far away, though one of them was asleep from genuine exhaustion and the other from flat-out boredom. The Doc was piloting, and silence seemed to reign aside from his occasional humming.   
  
Eventually though, silence yielded to a vague feeling of paranoia. His gut instinct was acting up again.   
  
"Hey Doc..."   
  
"What?" Steve answered, glancing back at the former mercenary from the helm.   
  
"Is the Scout Fox loaded into the launch system?"   
  
"Yes, why?"   
  
"Just asking..."   
  
  
With murder in his eyes, Kale pulled the trigger. An instant later, Shadow howled with delight as the stillness of night shattered into a million pieces, lightning flaring briefly in the background as the charged particle cannon let loose with it`s deadly attack.   
  
  
"Minute`s up! Surrender at once or be destroyed!"   
  
Silence. And then a chuckle.   
  
"I think I speak for both myself and the Liger here when I say: **_EAT ME!_**" Bit shouted back, and with his words, the entire enemy force opened fire at once.   
  
  
It was night time now, Fiona and Riese sat alone on the front porch of the two-story house, each staring thoughtfully off into the stars of the night sky. Neither spoke, neither needed to, they were both skilled telepaths and both knew what the other was thinking instinctively after having been around one another for over two hundred years now.   
  
_ "It`s starting."   
  
"I know."   
  
"They`re already razing the Wind Colony,"_ Riese thought to her old comrade as explosions and flames burned into view in the distance. It wasn`t _that_ far away, of course, but it was far enough that most of the explosions weren`t that visible in comparison to anything else. Black smoke billowed up from the former home of the Fleiheit family.   
  
_ "Do you think Cloud`s family will escape?"   
  
"Most likely not. Silvia is a good woman, quick on her feet but Richard is too stubborn. Hopefully they`ll survive, but I doubt it,"_ Fiona thought back, a bit of sorrow and a bit of pity edging at her tone.   
  
_ "Be strong. It`s needed for what we`re going to have to do soon..."   
  
"I know. It seems that when Van and Thomas died, they each took a bit more of my strength with them..."   
  
"I can relate,"_ Riese thought vaguely at Fiona`s mental sigh. The two women remained though, rocking back and forth as they were, neither speaking another mental word, yet both sharing an intense feeling of resignation at the same time.   
  
  
In Guygulos, a bell struck midnight. Across the world, television and radio receptions on every frequency were promptly cut off to reveal the face of a man with glossed black hair in his early thirties, standing in what had, until two minutes ago, been the command-and-control room of the Zoid Battle Commission. Blood stained the walls, bodies were everywhere and smoke was visible in the background.   
  
"Hello everyone..."   
  
  
** Incoming!   
  
** The temple exploded -   
  
  
_ We have to hurry!   
  
_ "I know that!" Bit yelled at the Organoid, taking the head off of a Rev Raptor in one swift pass, only to have the Liger Zero hit a dozen times at once from shells and plasma.   
  
  
"You may not know my name, but quite frankly, I don`t care."   
  
  
"What the hell is this supposed to be?" Mark asked in surprise, mirrored by both Abbie and Kyle. The Gustav pulled to a slow stop several dozen miles from Farentown.   
  
  
"My name is Vilhelm Rommel, I own and run the Rommel Corporation, which, as many in the military may know by the time they hear this, is responsible for the production of roughly two tenths of the military-owned Zoids across the world. As you may not know however..."   
  
The man raised a simple looking remote, with only a single switch and an antenna upon it.   
  
"That means two tenths of the world`s military happens to have a high powered suicide bomb located next to it`s Zoid core."   
  
With that, everything changed.   
  
  
"Doc!" Brad yelled out.   
  
"Eh?" Tauros asked, stirred from watching the broadcast to look over at his employee. "Launch the Scout Fox."   
  
"Wha?"   
  
"Do it!"   
  
"Fine, get in."   
  
"No, the thing`s got a fucking _bomb_ on it!"   
  
"... Crap," Tauros muttered, practically diving over Brad`s head, over the control consoles for the launcher. He landed with a thud onto his shoulder but was back on his feet by the time Jamie and Leena had started to wake up, already typing in the controls for the launch rail.   
  
  
- and the Razorwind Fury emerged from the flames, utterly unscathed thanks to it`s shields. Pillars of enormous strength had been shattered and broken by the blast from the charged particle cannon, the entire roof of the enormous structure was _gone_ and there was a hole through four of it`s six lower levels. Lightning blazed for an instant, Specular and Shadow ominously flared at each other in a telepathic exchange, while Kale and Vega silently narrowed their eyes in unison.   
  
Two clacks, the Geno Saurer`s footlocks unleashed, and with them, it started to move forward, it`s steps ringing hollow as a summer thunderstorm kicked into high gear, whisps of dust and smoke curling as what seemed like a tornado began to form.   
  
"End of the line," Kale stated.   
  
"I didn`t come for fancy chat," Vega replied angrily, all six of the Razorwind`s laser saws humming to life furiously. Both Zoids` optics flared a menacing red, and each slowly, calculatingly continued their mutual approach towards what was going to be their final showdown.   
  
  
Shots rang out, the Scout Fox tumbled from it`s feet briefly, a Rev Raptor went down and the Liger Zero howled in pain as another series of shots actually hit home on it`s left shoulder, followed by a Helcat`s paw swiping across that side of it`s face. The Zoid tumbled loosely onto it`s back legs, standing vertically for a split second before a pass from a Rev Raptor cut into it`s stomach in a flare of sparks and flame, sending the Ultimate X crashing to the ground on it`s back, then side.   
  
"Come on Zeke!" Bit shouted, rocking around violently under the assault.   
  
A flash of blue-white, the Zoid keelhauled along for several seconds on it`s side before streaking up into the air, one clawed foot slashing through the cockpit of another Rev Raptor in a glare of gold and crimson. The enemies were everywhere, it was hopeless.   
  
  
"Now, I`m sure you`re all shitting yourselves at the mad man who wants world domination, correct?" Rommel asked with mock understanding, waving the remote around rather plainly, then giving a cruel smile, like the devil himself had come up to the mortal realm for one last sadistic game.   
  
"World domination is for those who actually care. Consider this the kickstart of the apocalypse," he growled out, flipping the switch.   
  
  
The Blitz Team Scout Fox hurtled through the air and...   
  
  
Around the world, both the Guylos and Helic militaries, along with the military might of the Guardian Force and more than a few of the thousand or so Zoid battle teams were all crippled in a single instant, bombs going off at once in an eerie symphony of death. Each bomb in and of itself was too weak to destroy _everything_ around them, but coupled together, with the unleashed might of an exploding Zoid Core, the blasts were enough to tear apart six Zoids, which was exactly what happened. Six of almost every ten Zoids on Planet Zi went up in flames, two were horribly damaged and two more were left relatively unscathed.   
  
In a split second, _everything_ had changed.   
  
  
"_Fiona Alysse Linette-Fanel, come out with your hands up_!"   
  
Fiona chuckled to herself dryly, suddenly becoming visible to the dozens of heavily armed men and women currently standing in front of her house, guns levelled upon her. Riese became visible to them a second later, and both were already standing at the very edge of the peak of the hill. The chuckle that Fiona had let out wasn`t one of genuine humor, it was of utter resignation.   
  
"Come and get us," the two women ordered. Helcats and a Command Wolf stood behind the lines of soldiers, and in the distance, Cloud House - as it had come to be known over the years - was visible as nothing more than a funeral pyre of smoke and flame.   
  
"Have it your way!"   
  
With that, the troops charged forward.   
  
  
The transmission ended as abruptly as it had started. The militaries of the world were in shambles, and as Madison and Roc drew away from the thoughts of what it all meant, they both turned their attentions to the far north, stunning clarity ringing true in the First Born Organoid`s telepathic Voice as it spoke.   
  
** The Reign of Chaos has begun...   
  
**_

End New Age...  
  


_

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**Author`s Note:** *Cue dramatic music.* The cliffhanger from Hell >_> And there you go if you`re wondering what the next NA book will be called. Reign of Chaos, expect it once I finished the first chapter... Sorry for the relative shortness of this one, but I could only cram in so much and all @_@ And yes, consider this chapter to be the one where the Slow Building Conspiracy of Doom Button is fully un-pushed and the All Hell Breaks Loose Button is shoved down through the keyboard >_> Though I still have a whole shitload more **Hell** to break loose, this is the kick-off to it all.  
  
See you when ROC is out, until then: Read, review, enjoy, Sh33p out and see ya next time!  
  



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